Detective Fiction
by RobinRocks
Summary: LxLight. AU. Detective author Light Yagami's world is turned upside-down when a real detective needs his help solving a murder case fashioned after Light's own book. Trouble is, he doesn't remember writing it. DISCONTINUED.
1. C Auguste Dupin

Yay, new story! I've had this idea for a while, so… I'm glad to finally be able to get it out there.

So, um, yeah… Back last term I did a module for my university course about the detective story and its origins, different forms, inspiration from and impact on culture… It was very interesting indeed, and since _Death Note_ has something of a detective-story format, what with half of the characters being detectives of one variety or another, I really wanted to apply some of the genre specifics and analysis to it…

Hence the title of this fic. So, yeah, while this story isn't (I hope) going to turn out to be an annotated textbook example of a "detective story", I do intend to play with some of the basic rules of the genre - being, as it is, extremely formulaic.

But it'll be fun. It totally will.

:)

I – C. Auguste Dupin

"Well, there's nothing wrong with him physically," the doctor said, looking up from the file lying open on his desk, "and he's almost finished the rehabilitation programme—"

"Would you say it's amnesia?"

"A form of it, certainly." The doctor frowned. "But I… it's a _strange_ form. Often patients who show signs of amnesia have damage to either their long-term or short-term memory, but he… Well, there's nothing wrong with either. It's possibly a variation of trauma-induced amnesia, causing him to forget a particularly painful incident, but that still doesn't exactly add up."

"Does he remember the crash?"

"Yes, he does. That's what I mean about the "trauma" explanation not adding up – that's the one traumatic thing that happened, and it's probably the reason for what's happened to his memory, but that's not the thing that he's blanked out."

"No." The detective leaned back in his chair. "It's very strange… that the one thing – the _only_ thing – he doesn't remember is the fact that he's Kira."

The doctor smiled thinly.

"I'll tell you now that his agent isn't happy."

"I know – we've spoken." The detective stood. "And on that note… would it be alright if I spoke to _him_?"

"Well… I don't see a problem, but he _is_ being released from the hospital in three days. Can't it wait?"

"I'd rather not. A lot can happen in three days, doctor."

"That's a fair point. But that taken into consideration… you still haven't exactly told me why you're here. What exactly is it that you want with Light Yagami so urgently? Is it to do with the accident?"

"I'm afraid not. There was nothing suspicious about the crash that put him in here – it was an accident, as you said. Unfortunate, but common. It's more… to do with his work."

The doctor blinked.

"His novels?"

"Something like that." The detective took out a brown envelope and handed it across the desk. "These are the basic case details – I thought it would probably be worth the hospital to which he was admitted having a copy. It explains everything more concisely than I can. There's no conclusion to the mystery yet, of course – that's why _I'm_ here."

"Thankyou." The doctor began to open the envelope; but paused, looking up as the detective reached the door of the office. "You should be able to find his room easily, Detective…?"

"Yes, I trust that I shall." The detective leaned for a moment against the doorframe, looking at the doctor with his perceivingly-oblivional jet eyes. "And don't bother about the rank title. You can just call me L."

* * *

"I used to read stories with guys exactly like you in them," Light Yagami said, after a long moment of studying the man, calling himself a detective, who had just shown up at his door and asked if he might spare a moment to speak with him.

Having lived in the hospital for close to three months, firstly being treated for the wounds he had sustained in the car crash and then being moved out here to an adjacent apartment so that he could be monitored after showing signs of memory loss, Light was used to people coming in and out. So he hadn't been surprised by the knock at his door – but he _had_ been surprised by the instigator of the knock.

Mostly because he looked like he'd walked straight off a film set.

"You're… a real detective, aren't you?" Light went on, choosing his words carefully despite the fact that they sounded casual, even a little redundant.

And as he said it, he glanced again at the man's attire. Really… although it kind of suited him, was he joking? He'd said he was a detective, and hell, yes, he _looked_ like a detective… from about sixty years ago. He wore a black suit, with a white shirt and grey tie, and over it, open, a grey trenchcoat – and to top it, crowning his choppy raven hair, a matching grey fedora with a black silk band.

"Of course I'm a real detective," the "real detective" replied lazily. "Here." He pulled out a licence and handed it across to the younger man, who scanned it with narrowed amber eyes.

"Well, I didn't say I didn't believe you," Light replied shortly, handing it back.

"Then why the issue?"

"People… well, detectives…" Light folded his arms, growing irritated. "_Nobody_ dresses like that anymore!"

"I do."

Light snorted.

"I can see that." He paused for a moment. "And you said your name was 'L'?"

"I said you could _call_ me 'L', Yagami-kun."

"What's that, a codename?"

"Something like that, I guess."

"Hn." Light regarded him warily. "Well… you don't have to stand there." He gestured to the seat opposite his own. "You can sit down, if you want."

"That's very kind." L shot him a lazy little smile and sat down; Light had been expecting him to sit… _oddly_, somehow, but he didn't. He sat normally, took off his hat, put it next to him and gazed very pointedly at Light.

He said nothing.

"So why are you here?" Light bit out at length, starting to feel quite unsettled. "I haven't done anything."

L tilted his head.

"And how certainly can you say that, Yagami-kun?" he asked quietly. "From what I've heard, there's rather a large chunk of your memory missing – or being repressed, at least."

Light blinked.

"If you've only come here," he said coldly, "to accuse me of… I don't know, being a thief or a murderer or something, with the theory that I've lost my memory of it—"

"Oh, no, Yagami-kun," L interrupted swiftly. "Don't misunderstand my intention. I don't think that _you_ personally have done anything arrest-worthy."

"Then _why_ are you here?" Light pressed.

L gave a little sigh and averted his gaze to the ceiling for a moment.

"The truth is, Yagami-kun," he said quietly after a moment's consideration, "…I need your help."

Light stiffened imperceptively, taken aback by this statement.

"So, wait…" He kneaded his forehead briefly as he tried to make sense of what L was saying. "First of all you say that, technically, I can't be sure of _anything_ that I have or haven't done because I'm suffering from memory loss, and _then_ you say that _despite_ that, you want my help with something?"

"More or less."

Light gave another snort.

"If my memory loss is such a big deal, to the extent that you think I can't rightfully say that I haven't _murdered_ someone, then how would I be of any help to you?" he snapped.

"That's a good point – in fact, it's only fair to tell you now that you may in fact turn out to be completely useless," L replied pleasantly. "But this is actually a last resort. There's no-one else who can help me, Light Yagami – no-one but you."

"Help you do _what_?"

"Solve a case, of course. I _am_ a "real detective", after all."

Light couldn't help arching an eyebrow.

"And why am _I_ so special?" he asked coolly. "Why is someone who lost a portion of his memory after face-planting the dashboard the key to cracking this seemingly-impossible case of yours?"

"Because," L responded carefully, "it's the portion of your memory that you lost after you "face-planted the dashboard" that's what I need to unravel the mystery."

Light rolled his eyes.

"Well, good luck with that," he said nonchalantly. "Whatever it is you need… it's the one thing I don't remember."

"That's why I agreed that you may turn out to be completely useless." L smiled at him. "But for now, I'm optimistic."

"Well, that's a start," Light muttered sardonically.

L gave a little nod, either oblivious of or ignoring his sarcasm.

"Yes," he agreed absently. "It's good to have somewhere to start."

"And do _you_?"

L tilted his head at Light curiously.

"Of course," he replied. "I wouldn't be here otherwise, Yagami-kun. You ought to know that."

Light's expression became more sour.

"And why is that?" he asked coldly. "Why should I know why I'm your first port of call? You already said that I haven't done anything, but even if I _had_, I wouldn't remember it."

"That's an entirely fair defence on your part, but I…" L trailed off, apparently sinking deep into thought again. "Alright, well, there are two ways of going about this. Both come to the same conclusion in the end, so…"

"I don't follow."

"Don't worry – I'm confident that you'll be able to keep up. But first I need to decide…" L paused again; then leaned closer to Light across the gap between them, his dark eyes gleaming. "…Tell me, does the name 'Kira' mean anything to you?"

Light gave an irritated little sigh.

"That again?" he muttered blackly.

"So that's a no?"

"W-well… they've _told_ me that I—"

"But without them telling you, it wouldn't mean anything to you?"

"No."

"So you don't remember."

"No, I don't," Light bit out.

"Okay, then that's obviously not the best way to go. We'll come back to it. Even if you don't remember… I'm going to assume that you're familiar with detective fiction. You did just say that you had read stories about detectives… who looked like me."

Light hesitated, then gave a little nod.

"Japanese reprints of things like Raymond Chandler and Ellery Queen," he replied. "And manga modelled on those kinds of detective stories."

"Pulp," L mused. "Or the 'Hardboiled' genre, as the critics like to call it. The American reclaiming of the detective fiction format in the 1930s and 1940s. Okay, good. How about back further?"

Light frowned.

"How far?"

"How about the quintessential British detective story? You know, British upper-class amateur detectives solving murders in sleepy little villages in Kent and Yorkshire, or on transcontinental trains."

"Like Poirot?"

"Right."

Light shook his head.

"No, those never really interested me. Anything aside from Agatha Christie is difficult to find in Japanese, anyway."

"Ah, but Yagami-kun will surely not tell me that he has not read any of the Sherlock Holmes stories?"

Light scowled.

"Of course I have," he said sharply. "But those aren't from the same time period as the Agatha Christie novels."

"No, I know that – and I'm glad that you know, too. We're almost back at the source."

"Well… Sherlock Holmes was the first popular, consistently-recurring fictional detective."

"Of course – but not the prototype."

"No, I…" Light noted the way L was smiling at him, clearly amused by this little pop quiz. "…You're just _waiting_ for me to say 'Dupin', aren't you?"

"Ah, but of course." L gave a satisfied nod. "C. Auguste Dupin, the creation of Edgar Allan Poe – the original prototypical fictional detective, if you will. First appeared in _The Murders in the Rue Morgue_, published in 1841."

"Thanks for the History of Literature lesson," Light said coolly.

"Oh, I'm sure you didn't need me to tell you that."

"I didn't." Light raised his chin, his demeanour no less irritated despite the gentle flattery. "So what does Dupin have to do with why you're here?"

"Everything, I'm sure you'll find. You see, when writing _The Murders in the Rue Morgue_, Poe didn't _just_ create the prototype for every other fictional detective that has been invented since, from Holmes to Poirot to Marlowe. He also created the structure of the detective story – the formula by which the mechanics of that particular type of story works. Arguably, perhaps more so than any other form of fiction, the detective story relies on the impeccable balance of its elements – a poorly-written detective story will fail to have a satisfactory conclusion for either its characters or its readers."

"R-right, but—"

"So to strip down that structure critically… well, without getting into the complexities of the criminal mind or the methodology of solving a case, it actually becomes very simple: A criminal steals or murders, but only the outcome of the crime is revealed to both detective and reader at the beginning of the story. The bulk of the story is taken up by the investigation – that is, the uncovering of the murder or theft method by the detective, in addition to the mental or physical gathering of suspects. The story ends – and can only end – once the detective has reached a conclusion, pieced all the parts of the puzzle together and unveiled the identity of the perpetrator of the crime."

"That's not… Well, it's…" Light cut himself off and bit at his bottom lip for a long, incensed moment.

"Please don't feel that I am patronising you," L said airily, sensing the younger man's irritation. "I'm just making sure that we're of a common understanding. I trust that my thesis makes sense to you?"

"Of course it does," Light snapped. "But it doesn't explain anything – at least not anything about why _you're_ here. And I know I've asked you that about four times now, but you keep giving me all these cryptic answers about Dupin and detective stories! Whatever this case is that you apparently need my help with, I'm sure it's nothing like a detective story – real crimes are never as formulaic or—"

"No, you see, Yagami-kun," L interrupted calmly. "This is my problem. This case is _exactly_ like a detective story."

He looked very pointedly at Light, his black eyes locking with Light's coffee-coloured ones across the space between them.

"It's exactly like," he went on quietly, knowing that Light was, by now, enthralled by his words instead of annoyed, "_your_ detective story."

Light blinked at him.

"The detective story that _I_ supposedly wrote?" he clarified after a long, terse moment.

"One of them. Your latest."

Light gave him a piteous little smile.

"That's exactly what they've all told me," he responded genially. "The doctors, the nurses, the psychiatrists… That I'm supposedly an author of detective novels. Very successful, they say – famous, even. I've apparently written three to date under the pseudonym of 'Kira', derived from the Japanese pronunciation of the English noun 'killer'." Still smiling, half-amused and half-despairing, he began to shake his head. "But I don't remember. I don't remember ever writing even one book, never mind _three_—"

"You were working on a fourth at the time of the crash. Your agent has your original handwritten manuscript versions of the first four chapters."

The smile was still plastered on Light's handsome face as he leaned closer still to L.

"_But I don't remember_," he hissed. "I can't remember a thing about… about being Kira, or—"

"I know that."

Light hesitated, then leaned back again.

"Then I'm no good to you," he replied sharply, the smile having finally faded.

"Perhaps," L agreed again. "And perhaps not. Let's not be hasty in judging your worth to me, Yagami-kun. You may not _remember_ writing the story, but you still wrote it. I'm sure the thought process you employed whilst creating it is still in your mind somehow; perhaps only in the subconscious, but there all the same."

"Even if it is, and provided you are able to somehow get at it, how will that help?"

"Slow down, Yagami-kun. Let me tell you about my case first."

Light folded his arms and settled lower in his chair in response.

"Have you read them?" L then asked, deviating despite the fact that it was he who had previously redirected the conversation.

"Read _what_?" Light asked irritably.

"Your books, of course. If you don't remember writing them—"

"Yes, yes, I have," Light interrupted with a deep sigh. "One of the doctors brought me his copies to see if it would trigger my memory. It didn't, but I read them." He thumbed at the desk across the room, upon which, next to a closed laptop, was piled several books. "They're over there. I really need to give them back to him, come to think of it…"

L nodded distantly.

"Your debut novel, published when you were eighteen, is called _Ghosts of Dust_," he reeled off flatly. "It won several prestigious literature awards and paved the way for your second book, entitled _Poison Pen_. _Ghosts of Dust_ was a standalone story – a clever but formulaic detective tale of murder, lies and betrayal, weaved around the pursuit of a legendary, priceless jewel which, as it turned out in the end, did in fact never exist. _Poison Pen_, however, was the beginning of a series around a recurring detective character you created – a strange and original being whom you referred to in the story only as 'Ryuk', and who had a supernatural background, having been a God of Death, or Shinigami, before being cast out to Earth as punishment by the Shinigami King. So, with nothing to do in the human realm, he took on a human guise and became a detective, and his interest was quickly drawn to a strange sequence of events which were really quite horrific in detail, with people dying in all sorts of obscene and unusual ways. The mystery was laid bare when Ryuk found the "murderer" to be a pen made of human bone, cursed to take over the human who used it and make them write gruesome stories which became true. Both the premise and the popularity of _Poison Pen_ led to your third book, _Death Note_. The idea of an everyday item with the supernatural ability to kill was one which you presumably thought could be used further, and so this third book was about a notebook from Ryuk's own home-world – the Shinigami Realm. It had the power to kill the person whose name was written into it any way the writer chose, and it fell into the hands of a young man who thought the world would be better run without greedy, corrupt politicians, so he began to kill them. The guilt did, however, drive him mad, and he killed himself at the climax of the story. Ryuk, meanwhile, debated both destroying the notebook and taking it back to the Shinigami Realm, but the last passage of your book narrated him as keeping it instead – no doubt setting the scene for your next novel."

Light was nodding impatiently.

"I know that," he barbed. "I already told you that I read them. But I don't see… I mean, you say this case of yours is like the third book, _Death Note_, but unless a notebook like that has suddenly—"

"No, no, not the notebook itself," L interrupted blandly. "Don't be silly, Yagami-kun – you know such a thing exists only in stories. You invented the thing yourself."

"Then what—?"

"Well, now…" L smiled lazily at him. "You can certainly kill greedy, corrupt politicians _without_ a murderous notebook, can't you?"

Light's eyes narrowed.

"Politicians have been killed? I didn't hear about that."

"It's been kept fairly under wraps until now, but it's about to come out, I guarantee it – it's on the brink of being splashed over every news station and front page there is. The Government can't oppress the media forever."

"How many?"

"Five, so far. There will be more, I'm sure of it, if the killer isn't caught. The number might not sound very impressive compared to the scores the character in your book managed to kill, but our murderer doesn't have a Death Note to help him out."

Light's amber eyes grew sharper still.

"And why exactly are people immediately comparing the killings to the ones in my… well, that book?" he bit out. "There are loads of books about detectives and serial killers and, I mean, it's not as if politicians haven't been murdered before—"

"You'll recall the killings in the book," L interrupted lazily. "And, furthermore, the rules of the Death Note. You can kill your victim any way you like, dictating it via the notebook, as long as it is physically possible. If it isn't, or if you don't specify, the victim merely dies of a heart attack. By these rules, the killer in the book murders the first five politicians by specific methods of enforced suicide: The first by jumping from his hotel room window, the second by overdose on painkillers, the third by putting himself into a state of inescapable asphyxiation, the fourth by driving his car over the end of a pier and the fifth, most gruesomely, by committing the act of _Seppuku_. At the scene of the fifth "suicide" was found the message 'I am Justice', written by the politician in his blood on the floor before he died."

"But those are all suicides," Light argued. "Enforced, yes – but suicides all the same."

L nodded.

"Yes, that is true – and it is true that the five _real_ politician's death were certainly murders, not suicides, enforced or not. But… they have been engineered and set up to mirror the suicides in _Death Note_. They're not supposed to look like _actual_ suicides, you understand – they are merely supposed to look like _the_ suicides from your book."

"How… how can you tell?" Light asked faintly, beginning to feel slightly sick.

"Well," L said with a dry smile, "I _am_ a "real detective"."

"Don't joke about something like this," Light said in disgust.

"Who's joking?" L tilted his head. "But, if you must know… All the deaths are clearly murders. There are signs of struggle at four of the scenes – for example, the man who "suffocated himself" was found with a pillow over his face. You couldn't suffocate yourself like that – you would faint from a lack of air and your grip on the pillow would loosen, enabling you to breathe. Likewise, with the man who drove his car over the edge of the pier… when the car was retrieved, it was evident that the brake wires had been cut. As for the "Seppuku"… well, it was hardly the "art of suicide" used by the samurai. The man had clearly been butchered with the katana and the blade inserted into his stomach after death."

"What about… the message?"

"Hm? 'I am Justice'?"

"What else?"

"It was there on the floor, exactly where it should have been."

Light lowered his head, gazing intently at the floor.

"So…" he said faintly, "this… is _my_ fault."

"There are people ready to blame you, certainly," L replied. "The news hasn't gotten out into the masses yet, but it's known about in the kind of circles that would benefit from it, you may be sure. Mostly critics, of course, claiming that authors like you and books like yours are to blame for the debauchery of society. I wouldn't pay any attention to it, Yagami-kun – people with any real talent are always being blamed for something or other. It's like their punishment for being so gifted, you could say. As for your books, however… I'm afraid to say that a lot of bookshops have, at this moment, stopped selling them and the print run of the second edition has been postponed – perhaps even cancelled."

Light glanced up again.

"How do you know that?"

"I've spoken to your agent. I didn't want to come straight here and start bombarding you with questions, since I knew you'd been in an accident not long ago, so I went to your agent first. He told me to come here for a better analysis of how you were doing, but…" L gave a little shake of his head. "Well, your agent is still on your side, anyway. He's been defending your name and your novels in your "absence". He seems like a very big fan of yours, actually."

L gave a wry little smile on this and Light met his gaze coolly.

"Yes, he seems that way to me, too. He's come to visit me several times. He was disappointed at first that I didn't remember him—"

"You didn't remember your own agent?"

Light shook his head helplessly.

"I told you, I don't remember _anything_ about those wretched books," he spat. "I don't remember writing them, I don't remember getting any awards for them, I don't remember having Teru Mikami as an agent. I mean, we're "re-acquainted" now and he seems very nice and all, but I can't remember any of the stuff he tells me about. Apparently, before the crash, I was supposed to be entering the finalities of signing a deal for the rights to turn _Death Note_ into a movie. It was meant to have this famous actress Misa Amane in it, and I've apparently met her, but I don't remember that, either." Light gave a thin smile. "You'd think I'd remember that if nothing else, right? Meeting a famous actress? I mean, I know who she _is_ – but I don't remember ever being in the same room as her. But Mikami swears it happened."

L gave a little nod.

"The movie deal is on hold," he replied. "Mikami said he doesn't know what will happen with it, what with this politician thing, but they can't do anything without your signature anyway. But I didn't come here to talk to you about that."

"No." Light looked up at the detective again. "But I… I really don't think I'll be able to help you. I don't remember writing _Death Note_, and I don't remember the mindset I was in when I was writing it, and to be honest, now that you've told me about what that wackjob is doing – copying the murders from my story – I'm _glad_ I can't recall that mindset."

"That may be, but I would appreciate your help nonetheless, Yagami-kun. I don't think there's anyone else who can help me."

Light frowned.

"Why do you need help, anyway? For a "real detective" like you, surely a messy trail of murders like this is easy to follow right to your culprit?"

L only stood up and shot him a little smile.

"You'd think that, wouldn't you?" he replied nonchalantly. He offered Light his hand. "So are you going to help me or not?"

Light looked at his hand, hesitating; he was appalled by the news of the murders, copied from something that he had – supposedly – created, and also a little scared, and certain, too, that he could be of no help despite being the creator of the killer's inspirational source, because he just couldn't remember a damned thing about _Death Note_ at all.

But this L… This "real detective", with his authentic PI look, calm way of talking and clear level, logical intelligence… He seemed to genuinely believe that he would benefit from Light's help, whether he remembered writing the story or not, and although a part of Light desperately wanted to refuse, another part of him felt as though he mustn't, under any circumstance, deny the detective whatever meagre scrap of assistance he could give him.

Besides, Light was intelligent. He was logically-minded himself, very sharp and perceptive. All the doctors and psychiatrists had confirmed it, but he'd known anyway. Even if he couldn't remember anything about _Death Note_ or _Poison Pen_ or _Ghosts of Dust_ or whatever the hell else, if L were to put some evidence down in front of him, he would be able to puzzle it out, certainly.

So then…

"Okay." Light rose himself and placed his hand in L's to shake with him. "I'll help you any way I can, L."

L smiled at him over the handshake and then took his hand back, retrieving his fedora with it.

"I appreciate it," he said. "…Your doctor said you get out of here in three days?"

Light nodded.

"That's right. Mikami said he would come and get me."

"Tell him to cancel that arrangement. Our investigation starts officially the moment you are released. I do want to speak with your agent again, Yagami-kun, but we have some work to do first. I'll come and get you myself."

"I… w-well, okay, but…"

"Good." L nodded to him and crossed the room to leave. "Well, until then."

He flipped his fedora on and left the room, closing the door sharply behind him.

Light hovered for a moment or two; then found himself drifting almost unwillingly towards the desk. He sank into his chair and pulled out, from one of the stacks of books, the red and black paperback copy of _Death Note_. He held it in both hands out in front of him and just looked at it for a long while – at the blank background and synthetic decorative bloodstains on the lined black notebook and the yellowed human skull that made up the picture on the cover. He looked at the gothic font that spelled out the words 'Death Note'. He'd chosen to have the title written in English and for the pronunciation to thus be in English, Mikami had said. Whether for a gimmick or a deeper meaning, or…?

Although he felt a sudden sense of revulsion towards it, he nonetheless opened it to the first page and began to read the story that was supposed to be his own.

* * *

Oh noes! Mystery and intrigue and murder, oh my!

So… that's that so far. Light is a memoryless detective writer, the ever-adoring Mikami is his agent and L… looks like Inspector Gadget.

(Yes, I read the description of his attire back after writing it and thought "…Oh dear. I totally just described Inspector Gadget. You know, minus the gadgets.")

But I hope you liked it so far! Thankyou for reading!

RobinRocks xXx


	2. Sherlock Holmes

Wow, a really great response to this fic after only the first chapter! Thankyou so much, everyone who read, reviewed or both! I'm glad you all seem to be interested in the adventures of amnesiac-author!Light and Inspector Gadget-lookalike!L so far. :)

Thankyou to: **fantasies4eva, Star Jinin, RandomTopic, SeraphChronoMage, Hime, Skyaze, AuraBlackWolf, Famirka, Sanzo4ever, NeoAddctee, -Red Angel-Blue Angel-, InkedButterfly, Kutsushita-Socks, Kazutaka-kun, Gabi Howard, SK100187, Poison's Ivy, Other, .L-, Vera-Sama, EmotionalBypass13, Bligy, Deus3xMachina, imfromjupiter, Scripta Lexicona, yellowrose87, anon, DarkBombayAngel, bookenworum, deathnoteno1fan-codegeasslover **and **ravensbbf**!

So, yes! Moving swiftly on…

…to the most famous fictional detective of all!

II – Sherlock Holmes

Light was reading the book yet again when L showed up; still decked out in his stereotypical "detective" garb, he stood in the doorway with the accompanying doctor, folding his arms as Light looked up from his page.

"Light, the detective here says that you are to accompany him," the doctor said, seeming a little wary of his own words.

Light gracefully rose from his chair, looking coolly at L.

"That's right," he replied. "We'd already agreed that I would go with him."

The doctor gave a nod.

"Well, in that case, if you can just sign out at the desk on your way, you're free to go. You're already booked in for a check-up two weeks from now, so that's all you have to do."

Light gave a nod of his own, put on his coat, picked up his suitcase and tucked _Death Note_ under his arm, crossing to the door.

"Okay, we can go," he said to L, who offered no reply but a lazy smile, gesturing to the open door, signalling for him to go first.

He didn't say anything, in fact, until they were outside the hospital, standing under the concrete canopy that overhung the doorway.

"I've ordered us a taxi," he said shortly, beginning to hunt in the pockets of his trench coat in search of something.

"Hm?" Light tilted his head, glancing at him sidelong. "That surprises me."

"Does it? I'm not so unkind as to make you walk, Light-kun – I knew you would have a suitcase."

"No, not that. I figured you'd have, like… a chauffeur or something."

L glanced back up at him, pausing in his – thus far – fruitless hunt.

"Is that so?" he asked, seeming amused. "Why did you get that impression?"

Light shrugged, not really having an answer.

"I don't know, I just… I…" He scowled, growing cross. "It was just a silly assumption. I don't know why I thought that, okay?"

L laughed softly, opening his coat and checking the inside pocket.

"How many detectives have chauffeur-driven cars, Light-kun?" he asked, the question rhetoric. "Even Sherlock Holmes, who had Watson as his assistant, wasn't driven around by him… Ah, _there_ you are…"

He pulled out a packet of cigarettes and a silver lighter, offering the former to Light.

"No thankyou," Light replied in a hard voice.

He watched as L shrugged and took one out for himself with his teeth, lighting it up and giving a silent, smoky sigh of contentment.

"You smoke?" he went on.

L glanced at him.

"Obviously," he replied dryly. "Does that surprise you too?"

Light hesitated, then gave a small nod.

"I wouldn't have chalked you up as a smoker," he said.

L shrugged.

"That's because I didn't do it the first time you met me – so I have effectively shattered your first impression of me, haven't I?"

"Why didn't you?"

"I wouldn't smoke in a hospital, Light-kun. It would just be inviting doctors and nurses to lecture me."

"It's not healthy."

"I know."

"So why do you do it?"

L shrugged.

"If it wasn't this, it would be something else, wouldn't it? Sweets or alcohol or drugs… Sherlock Holmes took both cocaine and heroin, didn't he?"

"That's not an excuse!"

L smirked at him.

"Well, if only we were all as perfect as you, Yagami-_sama_."

"Don't insult me," Light bit out.

"You're right. I apologise." L glanced briefly at his cigarette. "But I'm still going to smoke this."

Light gave a snort of disgust.

"Go ahead, then," he muttered blackly.

L gave another little laugh.

"I like you, Light-kun," he said, leaning back against the wall.

"And don't say weird things to me," Light snapped.

L simply shot him a wry smile and said nothing else, redirecting his attention completely back to his cigarette; so Light distracted himself with the book again, opening it to the page he'd left off at.

As odd as it was, considering he had apparently written it, he couldn't say that he particularly _liked_ it – but that said, it still kept him reading. It was well-crafted in that manner, so as to ensnare his attention even as it failed to properly stimulate his interest.

"I thought you said you had read it," L said absently.

"I'm reading it again," Light replied tersely, not looking up.

L gave a shrug.

"Well, that's a good thing," he murmured. "It will help for you to know the book as well as you can, considering you can't remember what your thought process was when you wrote it."

"Mm."

"Where are you?"

"Day after the third murder."

L nodded, more to himself, and was quiet again until the black taxi cab pulled up; helping Light with his suitcase and giving the driver an address.

"How do you know my address?" Light demanded as the car began to move and L leaned back into his seat.

L glanced at him oddly.

"I've done my research, Light-kun," he replied. "That's how you should always start."

"It makes you seem like a stalker," Light sulked.

"Oh, Light-kun, I am certain that there are far more interesting people in Japan to stalk than an amnesiac detective author," L sighed genially, drawing on the remains of his cigarette. "Though I must admit that you are an exceptionally amusing person to argue with…"

"I'm not here to amuse you!" Light said indignantly.

"No, you're here to help me solve this case," L agreed. "And incidentally, you're the one starting the arguments. You're a very defensive person."

"I am not!"

L grinned at him.

"See?"

Light scowled at him.

"Oh, shut up," he muttered eventually, going back to _Death Note._

"Of course, I have a theory on why you're so defensive," L went on.

"I'm not listening anymore," Light said, his voice lilting like a little song.

L shrugged.

"A pity."

But he didn't speak to Light again, finishing his cigarette in thoughtful silence, gazing out of the window; Light looked up at him over the book, watching him for a long moment. He was so _odd_ – his attire at once both suited him and looked all wrong on him, maybe because it looked completely out of place amidst contemporary "fashion", even that of detectives. It was like he was only wearing that outfit because he thought that was what detectives were _supposed_ to wear.

Maybe he did. Maybe he'd grown up on those old pulp reprints as well, and had modelled himself after Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe.

But he didn't _act_ like them. His behaviour was, on the contrary, more eccentric – friendly but somehow still guarded, with peculiar little nuances and an intelligence Light could _sense_ about him, even though he hadn't truly displayed it. He got the impression that he could be ruthless and calculating – his mind carefully and tirelessly honed to the sharpness of a razor blade. His tongue, too, seemed sharp, even if he had been only mildly jesting with Light at this point.

Yes, he _behaved_ more like Sherlock Holmes – perhaps that connection coming easily because L himself had already mentioned Holmes twice since leaving the hospital – whilst looking like Philip Marlowe.

It was… a _bizarre_ combination – especially since it had been L himself too who had pointed out that there were vast differences between the eras of detective fiction. To then make a practice of merging the prototypes of Poe and Conan Doyle with the far later, more commodified variants created by the likes of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett seemed very hypocritical.

Somehow.

Light didn't think he had offended him, but L didn't talk again until they were at the door of Light's apartment, Light fishing his keys from his pocket with a melodic jingle.

"We can walk to your agent's office from here," the detective said, watching Light turn the key in the lock and push the door open.

"You want to see Mikami today?" Light asked, surprised.

"Only briefly."

"What help will he be?" Light went on, dragging his case into the hallway; he let L follow him in, pushing the front door shut behind him.

"Probably not much. But it's a good place to start."

"You keep saying that. It's like you have it all mapped out – how you should solve a case, with conveniently-numbered steps."

"Detective fiction is formulaic, isn't it?"

"Yes, but _this_ isn't a detective story!"

"It's modelled after one, though." He nodded towards _Death Note_, winched safely under Light's arm again. "_That_ one."

Light rolled his eyes, taking his case to his bedroom, L drifting after him as though a balloon on a string.

"You don't have to follow me, you know," Light said irritably, putting the suitcase on the bed and unzipping it.

"What else do you propose I do?"

"I don't know…" Light began taking things out of the case, not looking at him. "Honestly, I'm surprised you haven't pulled out a search warrant and started going through all of my cupboards…"

"I've already searched your apartment, Light-kun."

Light's head shot up.

"_What_?"

L gave a nonchalant shrug.

"I had to, once it became apparent that the murders were mirroring your book. The NPA did a search, too." He gave a little shake of his head. "Nothing was found, though."

"And what exactly were you _looking_ for?" Light barbed, having stopped unpacking to fold his arms in irritation.

L blinked at him.

"Light-kun, I have to tell you… When it was first noticed that the murders correlated exactly with _Death Note_, _you_ were a suspect. The prime suspect, in fact."

Light gave a snort.

"While I can see your point," he said sharply, "surely I wouldn't have been so idiotic as to mirror a string of murders after a book that _I_ wrote."

"You'd be surprised at how idiotic some criminals are," L replied dryly.

"Even so," Light countered, ignoring him, "how _could_ I have been the one responsible for the murders? I was in hospital all that time!"

"Well, that _is_ partly why suspicion against you was dropped – but it was considered that the car crash and your subsequent three month admittance to hospital to recuperate was merely a clever cover-up."

"It's a perfectly solid alibi!"

"My point exactly."

"Oh, come _on_!" Light almost laughed. "That's ridiculous! Who… who would even _think_ of that—?"

"You'd be surprised at how ingenious some criminals are," L cut in, allowing himself a very self-satisfied smile.

Light scowled at him and busied himself with unpacking again.

"Regardless," L went on, wandering over to Light's desk, "we don't have any suspects now."

"_We_?" Light glanced up at him again. "Are you actually affiliated with the NPA or ICPO or whatever?"

L shook his head.

"No, I'm a completely independent agent – but I know that neither of the organisations you mentioned have any suspects either. Still, I admit that it's hard to consider who would have a motive for killing those politicians…"

"What made you think that _I_ had a motive?!"

"Light-kun, please don't be offended," L said wearily, sinking into the chair at Light's desk. "It's perfectly natural that we would think of you as a suspect, given that you have the closest connection to the inspiration source for the murders – whether you remember that connection or not. But suspicion against you has been completely dropped, which leaves us, understandably, back at Square One with no suspects whatsoever, however tenuous."

"Another politician, perhaps?" Light suggested.

L gave a nod.

"I believe the NPA taskforce are looking into it from that angle. It's a distinct possibility. Politics is a nasty business."

"Or maybe it's more of a corporate thing," Light went on thoughtfully. "You know, like a company threatening the politicians of certain parties to get them to invest or front their advertising campaigns or something."

L nodded again in agreement.

"Again, an excellent theory, and one well worth looking into. But…" He pointed to _Death Note_, lying on the sheets of Light's bed. "Neither of them explain the connection with _that_."

Light gave a hopeless shrug.

"I don't know," he admitted. "Maybe… maybe it's just a red herring, you know? Just something to decorate the murders, to throw off the authorities…"

"Mm. Well, if that's the case, it's worked so far, hasn't it?"

"But you remained convinced nonetheless that we're chasing some psychotic fan of my books."

"Light-kun," L sighed, "I really have no idea. I told you – you're my final hope. I wouldn't have troubled you with this, the very day you got out of hospital after such a traumatic experience, if I had any other option, but I'm at my limit. I truly am."

"And I've told you that I'll help you," Light replied, "but… honestly, L, I don't know how _much_ of a help I'm going to be."

"Well, even if you turn out to be completely useless," L reasoned, amused again, "I'm sure I'll enjoy the company."

* * *

Teru Mikami's office was small and very, very neat – the kind of oppressive neatness that makes you afraid to touch anything for fear that you might move it a millimetre out of place and upset the balance of the self-absorbed universe that is that obsessively-organised space.

The agent himself was also extremely neat, almost implacably so; his hair was a glossy sheen of raven, like L's, but whilst longer it was also far neater, and although he also wore a tie like L, the knot of it was smaller, tighter, with clearly more time spent over it that morning before the mirror. He also wore glasses – thin and rectangular, perfectly complimenting the shape of his face.

In fact, everything about Teru Mikami seemed to both embody and demand complete perfection; but he seemed very pleased to see Light, his emotionless face suddenly coloured by a smile as he answered their knock and saw his favourite amnesia-afflicted author standing in the hall, L behind him, examining the ceiling with immense interest.

Mikami clasped his hands on the desk in front of him once he had Light and L sitting on the opposite side of it.

"I didn't think he'd have hunted you down already," he said, nodding towards L. "He came to see me last week."

"Did he tell you about the murders?"

Mikami nodded, smiling a little.

"Of course. Terrible business, but… great publicity, nonetheless."

"_Great_ publicity?" Light repeated. "I thought all the printings of my books had been cancelled?! Not that I disagree with that having happened, but—"

Mikami interrupted him with a little laugh.

"Scandal sells," he said in faux-morose tones.

"I thought it was '_Sex_ sells'."

"Scandal sells even better. Believe me." Mikami smiled wryly at him. "There's only one thing worse than being talked about, and that's not being talked about. Famous words, and wise indeed."

Light arched an eyebrow.

"Oh?"

Mikami nodded.

"Oscar Wilde. From _The Picture of Dorian Gray_, I believe. But enough about his books – let's talk about yours. _Your_ books are now not only notorious, but also hard to find – so naturally everybody wants them. Trust me, the sales of your next book are going to be _huge_."

"Mikami…" Light was shaking his head, wide-eyed. "There's not going to _be_ another book. I don't remember—"

"But I have the first four chapters. You gave the hand-written manuscript to me for safe-keeping, the way you always do."

"But I…" Light rubbed frustratedly at his forehead. "I don't _remember_ what should come next, so I can't write it, can I?"

"Well…" Mikami paused, albeit very briefly. "Then just write a new story. The fans _love_ your Death God Detective character, Ryuk. Granted, this whole murder thing has become something of an inconvenience where the movie deal is concerned. A lot of the production companies agree that it would probably do well at the box office, but they're concerned that it might not even _make_ it that far – that it might be pulled from production before its finished and scrapped because of the murder case. Misa Amane has agreed to front a campaign to get the deal finalised – after all, it would have been a huge stepping-stone in her career, but—"

"Mikami, _please_," Light interrupted wearily, "you're not listening to me. I don't think I _can_ write anymore. When I reread my books… I have no sense of how I would have constructed them, I don't get any sense of familiarity from them… Hell, you know, I don't even _like_ them!"

"But everyone else does," Mikami argued. "Light, they're a _phenomenon_, now more than ever. 'Kira' is the name on everybody's lips. There are authors who would _kill_ for this kind of publicity!"

_Kill…?_

Light looked at L; the detective was regarding Mikami rather lazily, very obviously not really paying very much attention to what he was saying. Hadn't he heard him? Authors who would kill…?

That was something that they hadn't considered, wasn't it? Another author? But why would another author, so jealous of 'Kira', want to _help_ his fame by…?

Unless… it had backfired. It was true that the murders had resulted in Light's books coming to a stop on the printing front and caused the movie deal to suffer equally, but both of those things had only made them even more famous than they had been before…

Mikami was shaking his head.

"Look, never mind," he sighed. "We'll worry about a new book once I've convinced them to start printing your old ones again…" He turned his attention to L. "Anyway, I presume this was your doing, detective. What can I do for you?"

"I want the manuscript," L replied calmly. "Well, plural. All of them. You have them, right?"

Mikami nodded, glancing again at Light.

"Are you okay with that, Light?"

Light nodded – actually, he kind of wanted to see them himself, mostly out of curiosity. He wanted to see these books that he'd allegedly written down on paper in his own handwriting, perhaps as _proof_ that he'd written them.

"Alright." Mikami went into his desk drawer and took out a bunch of small metal keys; then rose and went to one of the big filing cabinets against the wall behind his desk.

"Everything you have," L reiterated. "Any notes, any scrapped chapters… I'm going to need all of it."

"Yes, yes…" Mikami unlocked the top drawer and took out a cardboard filing box, tightly closed with metal clamps. It wasn't really all that big, but it was obviously heavier than it looked, for Mikami slammed it down on the desk with quite a bit of force. "This is everything," the agent said, sinking back into his chair. "Light is unusual – he likes to submit the first draft of his books by hand. Most other writers use a word processor or typewriter. This is all three of the full first draft manuscripts for_ Ghosts of Dust, Poison Pen _and_ Death_ _Note_, alongside the aforementioned first four chapters of his newest novel, plus a few notebooks containing plans and research notes."

L nodded and got up, picking up the box.

"Thankyou, Mikami. I'm sure this will be a great help."

He started towards the door; and Light rose too, nodding to Mikami before beginning to follow L.

"Who knows, Light," Mikami said from his desk, making him look at him again. "Maybe seeing all those books of yours written by your own pen will bring your memory back."

Light gave an absent nod.

"Maybe."

"And then you can write that fourth book and make me lots of money."

Light's smile soured.

"Bye, Mikami."

He shut the door behind him; L was waiting for him, still holding the box.

"More mercenary than he looks, hm?" the detective mused, of Mikami.

"Looks like it."

"Still, he has an excellent reputation as a literary agent. He obviously does his job well."

"Perhaps a little _too_ well," Light muttered, glancing at the box. "Here, I'll take that."

L blinked, then shrugged and put the box into his outstretched arms; Light hadn't been expecting its weight and almost buckled beneath it, struggling to adjust his grip on it without dropping it. He looked incredulously at L, who had been holding it without any indication of a problem whatsoever despite the fact that he was physically smaller than Light himself.

"What?" L asked.

"Jeez, forget Mikami," Light snapped, beginning to walk. "You're _stronger_ than you look."

L shrugged, falling into step alongside him.

"From you, I will take that as a compliment," he said.

* * *

"To be honest," L said, leaning against the doorframe, "I want to leave it here for today."

Light, kneeling on the floor of his living room, carefully taking the bound manuscripts out of the box, glanced up at him in surprise.

"It's only just gone midday," he replied, perplexed.

"I know, but I'm going to set you a little homework, and it's going to take you a while." L pointed to the manuscripts. "Read those. All of them. Every word that you wrote… I need you to read."

"L…!" Light shook his head incredulously. "Don't be ridiculous! That's asking me to read _three_ _books_ in less than—"

"I told you it would take a while." L wasn't smiling. "But this is important."

"L, look… I really don't think that this is going to help me get my memory back—"

"I know that. It doesn't matter. Maybe we don't need you to remember writing the books – but that doesn't change the fact that you _did_ write them. So I _need_ you to read those, Light-kun."

"L—"

"I'm leaving now. I'll be back tomorrow morning."

"I—no, _no_. _Wait_ a second." Light scrambled to his feet and followed him to the door of the apartment. "I wasn't going to protest again… I just…"

"What, Light-kun?"

"Well, I… had a thought…"

"Another theory?"

"Sort of. It was… something Mikami said."

"I wouldn't take a great many things that Mikami says very seriously, Light-kun. He's clever, I think – but superficially so."

"It's got nothing to do with how smart or not smart Mikami is," Light snapped, growing impatient. "He didn't even realise that he said it."

"And what did he say?"

"He said… that some authors would _kill_ to have this kind of publicity."

L frowned.

"As in… the kind of publicity that your books are getting right now?"

Light nodded.

"I don't think that he was implying anything," he went on. "I think it was just a thoughtless comment, but… it's something we didn't consider…"

"That it could be another author trying to sabotage you," L finished, clearly interested by Light's newest theory. "That's true… _And_ it's a perfect motive which ties together both the book and the murders." He drifted into thoughtful silence for a few moments. "Alright, I'll have a look into that, Light-kun, since it's an excellent thought. You read those manuscripts like I asked."

"Oh, sure," Light said jokingly, opening the front door to let L out. "Steal my idea, Mr Real Detective."

L looked back at him from the corridor, apparently not seeing the humour.

"Light-kun," he replied expressionlessly, "I'd be rather more concerned about the _murderer_ who stole your idea if I was you."

* * *

Fun fact: "Poly" is the Greek for "many" (as in Polytheism, etc), and ticks are little bloodsuckers. Do the math. :)

Hm, so… That Mikami. What to do with him, huh?

That said, it's fun to write him interacting with L, even if he's not as mad as he is in the canon. I often wish L had lived that long, just to have to deal with Mikami and his "Sakujo!!111!!11!1!!"-complex…

Soooo… oh noes, what will happen next?

I know. You don't. Har har har.

;)

RobinRocks xXx


	3. Hercule Poirot

Yay, thankyou for the reviews, everyone! I'm so glad everyone likes this fic! It's fun to write, so I'm happy that everyone is finding it fun to read… Sort of, anyway. :)

Thankyou: **angellovedark, bookenworum, VirtualDraconium, AuraBlackWolf, Vera-Sama, Bligy, RedAngelBlueAngel, ravensbff, KawaiiNekoMimi, redfoxmoon, NX-Loveless-XN, Scripta Lexciona, Gabi Howard, ?, Black-Dranzer-1119, SeraphChronoMage, Deus3xMachina, Star Jinin, Sanzo4eva, dreamerswaking, deathnoteno1fan-codegeasslover, blueandorangesky10, dance99, Nefarious61, Tamouri, EternalLove495, UchichaHinata2210 **and** ddz008**!

Moving along… Belgium apparently does good detectives (though I prefer their chocolate)…

Hercule Poirot

The doorbell woke him up.

Light wearily raised his aching head from the kitchen table, which was spread with pages of hand-written detective fiction; he had fallen asleep on top of page one-hundred-and-seventy-four of _Poison Pen_, half-finished cup of black coffee gone stone-cold beside him.

He got up, rubbing at his eyes and barely able to walk in a straight line as he left the kitchen and went down the hall of his apartment to answer the door, so barely-awake that he was only dimly aware that he probably looked like Hell. He leaned against the front door on opening it, mussing his hair.

"You fell asleep, then," L said blandly, folding his arms.

"Huh, I… yeah, I guess so…" Light felt his irritation spike up through his fatigue. "Hey, you asked a lot—"

"From someone who just got out of hospital?"

"From someone in _general_!"

"So you didn't manage to read all three?"

Light glared at him.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't just slam this door in your face," he bit out.

"I can give you several," L countered calmly, "but I'd rather not discuss them out here."

Light was silent for a moment, then finally stepped aside and allowed L to come in, letting the door swing shut loudly behind him.

"What time is it, anyway?" he asked, something of a groan colouring his voice.

"Around eight-thirty in the morning, Light-kun. I saw no point in me coming any earlier than this."

"Right." Light yawned and passed L, going back to the kitchen. He felt godawful, his muscles and spine both aching from having slept fully-clothed at the kitchen table. He was sure he hadn't slept for more than three hours, too – if only that hospital knew what L had begun putting him through, the very _day_ he had been released…

"Light-kun, why don't you go and have a shower to wake yourself up," L suggested flatly from the kitchen doorway, his voice completely devoid of an interrogative rise; watching Light sleepily begin to gather up the manuscript papers. "You'll feel much better for it."

Light paused and glanced up, surprised by his words – by his apparent concern for him.

"So you're _not_ as self-serving as you pretend," he said, allowing himself a smirk.

"Oh, I am," L replied absently. "How am I supposed to work with you if you're stumbling around half-asleep, rubbing the crick in your neck that just won't go away?"

Light's eyes narrowed; but L only shot him an amused smile.

"How well do you propose to know me, Light-kun?" he asked, a cheerful little lilt to his voice.

Light merely gave a snort of disgust in response, stalking past L out of the kitchen. He really did find him very annoying, and right now was no exception – but, at the same time, he couldn't help but be fascinated by him, by the way he spoke, by the process of his mind, by the way in which he was so thoroughly a "detective" he almost became a parody of the term…

No; that was it, wasn't it? That juxtaposition present in even his very _reaction_ to L said it all. He didn't understand anything about him – couldn't decide if he even _liked_ him or not. It was almost as though… he, or his presence, didn't demand that kind of evaluation on the part of whoever he presented himself to.

He was so thoroughly a detective that he was nothing else. He elicited nothing. He demanded nothing. He was simply there – as he was.

Not that that made him easy to read. It was true – Light could not propose to know him at all. But still, the idea that he was so natural, so simple, even his title consisting of only a single letter…

Somehow, that was frightening. Something about the fact that L was knowingly showing him all his cards and yet Light still could not know a thing about him…

Something about that scared Light to death.

He showered quickly, enjoying it; letting the soap and steam and hot water ease away the memory of ache etched so painstakingly into his body by the way he had slept.

Although reading and rereading stories that he had supposedly written had not helped him to remember doing so, he had to admit – albeit begrudgingly – that this kind of tired all-over-ache, the tattoo of the workaholic, was somehow familiar to him. His body knew it, even if his mind could not supply the information or experience to back it up.

Truthfully, however, he didn't see what good it would be either way – whether he remembered writing the books or not, and _Death Note_ in particular, it didn't change the fact that some lunatic was out there copying the murders from the book in question. Even if he _could_ recall sitting at a desk and uncapping his pen and writing with smooth, confident strokes until his hand ached, it surely wouldn't make any difference.

L wanted him to be the author of _Death Note_ so that he could pick his brains to solve this case – but Light didn't see the value in him being the author, really.

L wasn't Ryuk, after all.

He smelled fresh coffee as he changed into clean clothes; unsure of whether to be grateful of or irritated by L's apparent making-himself-quite-at-home to the extent where he was quite happy to ransack his cupboards.

Not that that was anything new, by the sounds of it.

He re-entered the kitchen in black jeans and a white T-shirt, a grey button-down shirt open over it, with his auburn hair damp, the colour a little darker for its condition; L had left the coffee filter in the middle of the kitchen table to settle, and was preoccupied with quickly and deftly reorganising the sheets of the manuscript Light had left scattered across its surface.

He had taken off his trenchcoat, fedora and jacket; so that Light could easily observe that the Noir Detective Theme didn't end with only those items of clothing. The style still clung to him, present in his white shirt, black slacks, loose tie, the cut of his grey waistcoat, and…

Braces. Light was even a little amused. L couldn't be more than twenty-four or twenty-five. _Nobody_ that age wore braces – and _even_ in men forty-five and over, it was uncommon.

Still, maybe he wasn't surprised; at least not anymore. And L didn't seem overtly bothered by what people thought of his appearance, anyway.

Which, admittedly, was something Light kind of admired in a person (though it was not something that _he_ personally would ever employ).

Besides, it wasn't like L was a slob. He was dressed well – just… _wrong_.

"I made coffee," L said, glancing up at him.

"I can see that," Light replied blandly, sitting down. "…Thanks." He reached for the filter and poured the hot black liquid into each of the small cups L had put out, then rose and headed towards the fridge. "Milk?"

"Oh, yes." L nodded as he put the papers back in their box. "I apologise. I forgot."

"You don't have to apologise," Light replied, a little bemused. "Do you take sugar?"

"No." L sat at the table and looked at him as he came back with the milk carton. "…Let me guess: That surprises you."

Light shrugged, pouring a little milk into each coffee cup.

"Well, maybe you just remind me of someone," he said stiffly.

"Someone you remember?" L asked, drawing his cup towards himself. "Or someone you don't?"

"I don't know." Light sank back into his own seat. "Anyway, I said 'maybe'."

"True." L sipped at his coffee. "To be perfectly honest… I've never tried coffee with sugar. It's never appealed to me."

"I have."

"Any good?"

"I prefer it without."

L gave an absent nod; and for a long moment there was complete silence between them.

"There's been another murder," the detective said finally, his tone completely emotionless, plucking the statement utterly out of the blue.

Light spat his mouthful of coffee onto the table.

"_And when exactly were you planning to get to that_?!" he spluttered, slamming down his cup and adding to the pool of coffee already splattered over the table's surface.

L simply rolled his eyes.

"Well, I admit that I _did_ take you for rather the drama queen," he said dryly. "Incidentally, I did just share the information with you – and did not care to do so any earlier in mind of wishing to avoid an outburst exactly like that one."

"Well, it didn't work," Light replied sourly, getting up to fetch a paper towel.

"I noticed." L disinterestedly watched him mop up the coffee. "Either way, I didn't think you would welcome that news on opening the door to me."

"How considerate of you." Light tossed the towel into the bin and sat down again, leaning across the table towards L, looking at him with narrowed eyes. "So spill already."

"There's been a sixth murder," L rattled off flatly. "Politician. Aged fifty-one. Name of Takahiro Hoshi. Arsenic poisoning. Enforced, naturally – but, again, mirrored after a suicide mentioned merely in passing in _Death Note_."

Light leaned back again, sighing.

"Those damn books," he murmured, looking up at the ceiling.

"That's hardly fair, Light-kun – to either yourself or the thousands of non-murderous fans of your novels."

"I wish I'd never written them," Light said bitterly.

"And _that_ is rather arrogant." L sipped complacently at his coffee. "I presume that _Death Note_ is nothing but a model, or a scapegoat, for this murderer. If it did not exist, they would undoubtedly have moulded their agenda around something else."

Light glanced at him.

"You… don't think _Death Note_ inspired the murders?" he asked.

L shook his head.

"No," he replied levelly. "It's a springboard, perhaps, and a distraction, certainly – even something of a _message_. But the murderer most certainly was not inspired to kill politicians by your books alone. They will have had issues, either mental or simply _with_ politicians, to begin with."

Light couldn't help but smile wryly at him.

"So you're not a firm believer in the whole 'Literature can inspire' thing, then?"

"I don't like to think that it could inspire somebody to murder, at any rate," L replied.

"And you consider that a satisfactory basis on which to completely rule it out?"

"Well," L countered calmly, looking right at him, "that's entirely why I'm here, isn't it?"

Light returned his gaze, but could formulate no reply; watching L look very intently at his coffee and waiting for him to speak again instead.

"Incidentally," the detective said eventually, as though obeying Light's silent order to say something else, to cover for his own lack of articulation, "it shouldn't be _my_ job to defend literature, Light-kun. I would have thought that was rather more your field."

"I'm not going to defend those books," Light bit out stiffly. "If they're even—"

"Oh, come now," L sighed. "Blaming a _book_ for these deaths is ridiculous. Even within the fictional confines of _Death Note_ itself… the notebook was nothing but a tool. It did not kill anyone – the person who was using it did. So please don't blur the line between fiction and reality any more than it has been already. I could do without that kind of handicap entirely."

Light gave an impatient sigh, glancing up at the kitchen ceiling.

"So, what about the murder?" he asked at length.

"I was rather hoping you wouldn't mind accompanying me to the crime scene."

Light looked back at him again in surprise.

"You haven't been yet?"

L shook his head.

"No. I like to let the police do what they will first. They're like vultures. It really is a rather appalling method of conduct they employ, but I suppose that's not really any of my business."

Light gave an absent nod.

"When do you want to go?"

"Whenever you're ready."

"Okay." Light finished up his coffee. "I guess we can grab breakfast afterwards, right?"

L glanced up at him in amusement.

"Sure," he replied. "…That is, if you still have an appetite by then."

* * *

As was to be expected, the apartment was heavily cordoned off with a bright yellow cat's-cradle of police tape. There were also several uniformed NPA officers scattered around, to most of which L disinterestedly flashed his license when it was so demanded.

Fancy apartment. High-rise building, eleventh floor – one of the walls was entirely window, overlooking the best part of downtown Tokyo. Cream walls, thick burgundy carpet, white leather sofa. There were signs of struggle, of course – the glass coffee table was smashed in directly through the centre and the entire CD collection, alongside several ornaments, scattered the floor.

Also on the floor was the body of Takahiro Hoshi. Eyes wide, more discoloured white than pupil, face contorted, remains of arsenic-laced foam at the mouth.

Light found that he had to look away after a moment. A dead politician, having met exactly the same fate, had been described in _Death Note_. To have written it, he presumed that he had done some kind of research, even if he now – mercifully – didn't remember it. But even so…

In writing, it was not nearly so horrible as _seeing_ it.

It didn't have the same effect on L, who stood over the dead man in complete silence for a long moment, clearly immersed in very deep thought.

Of course, to L and those like him – these men in uniform who milled about, muttering to one another over paper cups of cheap instant coffee – this was little different to an office. Pen, computer, photocopier, corpse on floor…

He understood. They were desensitised (or maybe they'd simply never been sensitised in the first place). This was just a workplace. Another nine-to-five. Nothing to write home about—

But something to write a _novel_ about – or so it seemed to be a good idea, when the author drew his pictures from only his imagination and not his experience or memory.

But he was lucky. It could have been worse. There had been worse murders than this, after all. The faux _Seppuku_, or the man who had been pushed from his apartment window. He had not seen those, not the ruthless butchering, nor the smear on the sidewalk…

"Light-kun?" L touched him on the shoulder, making him turn to him – the motion perhaps a little more abrupt than he'd intended. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you."

"Oh, it's okay…" Light gave a little shake of his head. "I just…"

"Maybe I shouldn't have brought you here after all."

"It's _fine_," Light insisted, starting to grow slightly annoyed by L's apologetic treatment of him in regards to his apparent inability to be completely 'Whatever' about seeing the corpse of an arsenic victim sprawled out of the floor of his own apartment as little more than a piece of meat for – L's analogy aside – these law-enforcement-vultures.

"Well, I'm ready to go now, anyway," L said calmly.

"Already?"

L shrugged.

"Believe it or not, there's not much to see here."

"Is that right."

L tilted his head at him.

"Confusing fiction and reality again, Light-kun?" he asked curiously. "This isn't like the movies."

"But you didn't even look around the apartment!" Light countered. "You could be missing some kind of valuable clue, or—"

"I think I can manage," L interrupted coolly. "Shall we?"

Light had no choice but to nod and begin to follow him; but halfway across the apartment they were intercepted by two figures, both male, fairly young, one with blonde hair and the other a flaming shade of red. Neither was in uniform – plainclothes and then some, apparently, with the blonde all in black and the redhead in black-and-white stripes and heavy cargo pants.

"I'm going to assume you have a license," the blonde said drolly; though his body language was more subtly aggressive than his tone.

"Of course." L didn't seem offended – on the contrary, rather amused – as he handed it over for inspection.

"Hn." The blonde snorted. "Private, huh?"

"Last I checked." L arched an eyebrow at them both; the redhead gave him a nonchalant shrug. "Though this is most certainly a two-way road, gentlemen."

The blonde's dark eyes shot up.

"We were brought in specially by the NPA," he bit out. "This is _our_ case."

"Oh, I'm not calling you a liar," L replied airily. "But I also have no basis on which to form a concrete belief that what you're telling me is the truth."

The blonde opened his mouth – but the redhead laid a hand on his shoulder to silence him, and handed across his own license, dug from one of his pockets.

"Leave it, Mello," he said coolly. "This guy's not the enemy here."

Mello glanced at him; then huffed out an impatient little sigh, found his own license and thrust both it and L's own card at him. L pocketed his and glanced at both of the new cards he'd been given – Light looked over his shoulder to read them.

The text on the licenses was in English. Like L, they both seemed to go by (what he presumed were) codenames. The blonde, as they knew by this point, was 'Mello' and the redhead went by simply 'Matt'. Each had a different code number, but other than that, most of the information the two licences was identical – both held the rank of 'Investigator', employed by an investigative agency called Wammy's House.

"Based in Winchester, England, am I right?" L asked lazily, looking up from Mello to Matt.

Mello didn't respond, but Matt gave a small nod.

"You know it?"

"I know _of_ it." L gave them both their licenses back.

"Hey," Mello said sharply, giving a sudden nod towards Light. "What about him? Is he authorised to be in here?"

"Oh, he's with me."

"That's not what I asked," Mello said coldly.

L smiled.

"Ah, you _don't_ recognise him," he observed. "I presumed as much."

"Should we?"

"Well, I hardly have him follow me for the means of pop-quizzing whoever I might run into," L responded, "but given the nature of this case… I _do_ think you might have done your research a little more thoroughly."

Mello glowered at him; L didn't seem overtly bothered, but Light sensed the tension rising and decided it would probably be best to diffuse it. After all, he could sympathise with Mello's irritation; L did have a particularly condescending manner, whether he intended for it to seem quite so disdainful or not.

"I'm Light Yagami," he said, stepping forwards and extended his hand towards Mello. "Or 'Kira', as, I regret to say, I'm better known."

Mello eyed him warily for a moment, then shook with him.

"The author," he supplied finally, though he looked more at L as he spoke; averting his gaze from Light entirely as he shook with Matt too.

"Just a little asset I picked up," L agreed blandly. "He has yet to prove his worth."

"Weren't you in a car accident?" Matt asked Light.

Light nodded.

"Several months ago now," he replied. "I just got out of hospital."

Matt raised his eyebrows.

"Well, I'm glad to see you've made a full recovery."

"Thanks—" Light started; but L cut him off:

"Hardly a _full_ recovery," he said expressionlessly. "Let's not forget the severe amnesia, Light-kun – as ironic as that statement may be."

Light shot him a sour look, but offered nothing.

"Severe amnesia?" Mello repeated cautiously, glancing at Light.

"Trauma-induced," L went on. "He actually doesn't remember a thing about being Kira or writing those books."

"Have you _finished_?!" Light snapped, irritated by L's callous, emotionless bedside manner.

L blinked at him.

"Well, let's not have any pretence here," he responded curtly. "You _don't_ remember either of those things. I'm not saying it to insult you. It's simply fact."

"Well," Mello said a trace of a smirk ghosting across his face, "I'd hardly call him an _asset_, in that case."

L shrugged.

"I admitted that he has yet to prove his worth as such," he murmured. "Anyway, we were just leaving. Excuse us." He cut between Mello and Matt, making for the door; Light floundered for a second, then nodded to the two young detectives and quickly followed L, leaving them both standing in the middle of the apartment.

Silence.

"_What_?" Matt asked finally, his tone a little impatient.

"I didn't say anything," was Mello's reflexive, rehearsed reply.

* * *

"Well, I did warn you," L mused; watching Light play uninterestedly with his food.

Light glared up at him.

"Yes, you seem to be rather the authority on me, don't you?" he snapped; and he speared a nori roll with a chopstick and put it into his mouth more out of defiance than anything else.

L shook his head, more to himself, and sipped at his tea.

"Anyway, never mind about me," Light went on, swallowing his mouthful of sushi and pointing at L across the table with his chopstick. "What about you?"

L blinked and looked up.

"What _about_ me?" he asked.

"Well, what do you think about the case, and about the sixth murder itself, and, I mean, those two, Mello and Matt… they didn't seem exactly thrilled by your presence."

"Oh, that," L replied dismissively. "I'm not surprised. You heard what Mello said – they've been brought in specifically by the NPA. They're working for the authorities, and on top of that, they're actually members of an agency."

Light shrugged.

"So?"

"Well, you've read Agatha Christie, haven't you, Light-kun?" L tilted his head. "It's a fact that most of her detective stories were about the 'gentleman detective' – that is, the English format, in which an amateur detective, typically of the British upper-class, solves the mystery, most usually after the authorities have failed to do so. Examples included Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey as well as Christie's Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot."

"What's your point?"

"My point is that detectives working for the authorities don't like detectives _not_ working for the authorities."

"That's ridiculous."

"I know."

"No, I mean it's ridiculous that you're making that assumption based on Poirot stories," Light corrected icily. "Besides, you're not an "amateur". You're a proper, licensed private detective."

L shrugged again.

"Either way, you heard Mello. He was rather possessive when he said "This is _our_ case" – as I'm sure you'll recall."

Light couldn't argue with that and fell silent, going back to toying with his sushi.

"As for the murder…" L paused, looking up at the ceiling. "It all seems perfectly redundant. It's simply fallen into a pattern of copying the murders from the book."

"Isn't that exactly what it was in the first place?"

"Yes, but at this point it has become purely methodical." L smiled at him. "But don't worry. I'm just waiting for the murderer to get as bored as we are, bored enough to change the game-plan; and when he does—"

"_Wait_, L!" Light interrupted incredulously. "You can't just… I mean, just letting him kill until he gets tired of copying the murders in my book… You can't _do_ that! Who knows how many people he'll kill before that happens – or… or maybe it won't happen at _all_, and then—"

"I might have known you'd react like that," L interrupted calmly; seeming, for some reason, rather satisfied by Light's outburst.

"Think of something else, Mr Real Detective," Light bit out coldly in reply.

"I'm trying, Light-kun," L sighed; and he went back to his tea.

After they were done and had left the café, they began to head back towards Light's apartment; L more interested in the cigarette he appeared to have magicked up out of thin air than he was in his companion.

"You _really_ shouldn't smoke," Light said in disgust.

"That's amazing," was L's droll reply as he held out the pack in front of him, examining the small box on it in which 'SMOKING KILLS' was scrawled in big threatening letters. "They even have sound now – to squawk in your ear about the early grave you're undoubtedly sending yourself to with every drag."

"I don't know why you think this is a joke," Light snapped.

L shrugged.

"I don't know why I do it," he admitted, "but I do, so there. Besides, Poirot smoked."

"Oh, don't start this again," Light groaned. "Sherlock Holmes did cocaine. So what?"

L simply smirked and didn't say anything else.

Light was ahead by the time they reached the floor his apartment was on, fishing in his pocket for his keys; on looking up, however, he found his front door obstructed by a woman.

A very beautiful young woman with long blonde hair – he recognised her, but only from posters and movies.

Of course, they'd met. Allegedly. But he didn't remember.

_She_ seemed to, however.

Which still didn't explain why she – a famous movie star – was standing on his doorstep.

She turned towards him and her pretty face lit up; and he felt L rest a hand on his shoulder, clearly amused.

"I'm not going to take credit for this," he said, "but still… it's something else, right?"

* * *

Okay, so, at this point, it maybe seems like I'm just cramming in cameos from _Death Note_ characters by the boatload – but Mello, Matt and Misa (and Mikami) all have important roles to play.

ZOMG, so many 'M's… O.o Should have gone for broke and put in Matsuda, Mogi, Mido, Misora (Naomi), heh heh heh…

**Fun fact:** The name of the politician, 'Takahiro Hoshi', is an amalgamation of names of _Code Geass_ voice actors – 'Takahiro' coming from both Takahiro Sakurai and Takahiro Mizushima (the voice actors for Suzaku Kururugi and Rolo Lamperouge, respectively) and 'Hoshi' coming from Soichiro Hoshi (voice actor for Gino Weinberg – though his first name is kind of ironic, ne?). So when you need a convincing-sounding Japanese name, look to your _Code Geass R2_ soundtrack CD! Booyah!

**Not-so-fun fact**: You know, this is pretty much completely unrelated, but I figured I would mention it here because… well, this fic follows the storyline of some crazy killer murdering, essentially, because of a book. It's meant to be a parallel to _Death Note_ itself, the murder weapon in that actually _being_ a book (of sorts), but I wondered if anyone had heard about the recent and, frankly, shockingly-high number of attacks by insane _Twilight_ fans on… pretty much everyone else. I didn't know much about it myself until recently – which is partly why I'm mentioning it here. Because it surprises me that there hasn't been more publicity about it, given how (undeservingly) famous _Twilight_ is. I mean, seriously, one guy had _acid_ thrown in his face. ACID. The forum 'Twilight Sucks' has been collecting a "directory" of the attacks – there's a link to the list on my profile (it's the last link) if anyone is interested in looking. I mean, _seriously_. Nothing has fans like this. _Harry Potter_ doesn't. _Naruto_ doesn't. _Batman_, _Star Wars_, _Lord of the Rings_… I mean, yeah, you have your obsessed fans, but they don't attack "non-believers". Jesus, last I checked, attacking people who don't agree with you was a form of terrorism/oppression… O.o

I hardly respect Stephanie Meyer as it is, and although I don't _blame_ her for the attacks (I'm sure that wasn't her intention, whatever else we might say about her), the fact that she hasn't said anything to these insane Twihards is not remotely comforting. If she doesn't know or just doesn't care… neither is acceptable, really. She _needs_ to say something about it. Seems like she's the only one they'll listen to.

So, yeah, maybe that was kind of a strange thing to mention in relation to this fic, but the violence of some of these attacks makes me worry that somebody _is_ going to be killed over a stupid vampire book. Honestly, if they were kids from religious groups or a cult or something, it would be _plastered_ all over the news…

Um, anyway, thankyou for reading! :)

RR xXx


	4. Dick Tracy

OMG! I am SO sorry it took me so long to update! Over two months… You guys are all very patient! Thankyou so much for bearing with me, and also for all your reviews! :)

Mello and Matt cameos went down well – Misa not so well, it seems. Nonetheless, I'm afraid you'll have to suffer through her this chapter, because she comes as a bearer of… well, _important_ news.

Besides, I like her, so nyah.

Thankyou to: **FacelessIdol, Deus3xMachina, sayuri2023, Gabi Howard, Narroch, PikaNecoMico, zoningout, Synonymous Brian, Bligy, Black-Dranzer-1119, angellovedark, deathnoteno1fan-codegeasslover, Star Jinin, ahoythere, ddz008, berkie88, SakuraCa, Red Angel-Blue Angel, redfoxmoon, SeraphChronoMage, bookenworum, Vera-Sama, Scripta Lexicona, Tamouri, ?, Skyhe, ZoneRobotnik, Guardian of Courage, badwolf5, Bleu vie, Failing Mentality **and **Dahlia Franks**!

One issue to clear up before we begin: There seemed to be some confusion last time with something that I referred to as "braces". I meant what I believe you guys in the USA (if you're in the USA) call "suspenders". They are called braces here in Britain – or they were, at least, last time I heard.

Either way, I meant those old-fashioned things that hold your trousers up. They were "in fashion" again a few months ago, so places like Claire's Accessories, Blue Banana (the British Hot Topic) and Hot Topic (the American Blue Banana) were selling them in weird fluorescent colours and with skulls on.

I never saw anyone wearing them. O.o

Dick Tracy

"Can I… can I get you anything, Ms Amane?" Light asked, finding himself slightly flustered, as he watched the young actress sit down at the kitchen table. "Tea? Coffee?"

Misa Amane shook her head, blonde bunches swinging like liquescent pendulums.

"No thankyou," she replied politely. "I'm fine."

She began to fix her skirt as Light leaned awkwardly against the sideboard, unsure of what to do with himself; out of the corner of his eye, he was aware of L lounging in the kitchen doorway, his arms lazily folded.

There was a very long, terse moment of awkward silence – which neither Light nor Misa seemed to want to break, and which L idly observed.

Finally Misa turned her attention towards L, tilting her head a little.

"Are you another actor?" she asked him, taking note of his out-of-time attire. "For the _Death Note_ movie? I haven't been given a complete cast-list since production has been halted, so—"

"No, Amane-san," L interrupted calmly, shaking his head. "I'm not an actor. I'm a detective." He glanced down at himself briefly. "A _real_ one."

She blinked her carefully-made-up eyes at him in surprise.

"…Do detectives really dress like that?" she asked.

L shrugged, returning his gaze to her.

"We dress however we want."

Misa looked at him a while longer, then returned her gaze to Light.

"You must know about the murders," she said. "There's no way you couldn't know. I-I'm aware that you only just got out of hospital, but it's been all over the news and the movie's been put on hold, it might even be cancelled, and I know the second printing of your books was retracted…"

Light nodded.

"Yes, I know," he replied quietly. He nodded towards L. "That's why _he's_ here."

"As the author of what I will only vaguely refer to as the "inspiration" for the murders," L said, addressing Misa, "Light-kun is helping me with my investigation."

"Is that why _you're_ here, Ms Amane?" Light added, also speaking directly to the young actress. "The murders?"

She gave a nod, twisting her fingers together.

"I wanted to know your standing on them," she said.

"I completely condemn them," Light replied immediately.

"And what about the repercussions they've had on your books and the movie?" she pressed.

"Well, by the sounds of it, Mikami's been trying his best to whip the whole thing into some kind of media circus that will benefit the sales, but, personally, I couldn't care less about how much damage the murders do to them," Light said flatly. "In fact, I'm _glad_ that they want to retract the books and stop the movie – if they're going to make people behave like that—"

"Light-kun," L cut in boredly, "we had this discussion, remember? Your books aren't responsible for turning _anyone_ into a serial killer – our murderer was _already_ of a mind-set disposed to such actions, I completely assure you. _Death Note_ is merely a model for his or her agenda."

"At this point, does that make any difference?" Light bit out in reply, turning his hot amber gaze on the detective. "Six people are dead."

More silence. L shifted his weight a little, looking at Light with grim amusement.

"I expect your agent told you about my involvement in the campaign to get the movie production back on track," Misa said finally. "That's… why I came, really. I wanted to know… if you approve."

Light looked at her tiredly.

"Not really," he said in reply. "I mean, I already said—"

"I know," Misa interrupted quickly, "but the thing is…" She gave a sudden little sigh, seeming to become frustrated. "Light," she said, renewing her tone, leaning determinedly across the kitchen table. "I think you need to know what you've created."

Light blinked at her bewilderment.

"What I've… _created_…?" he repeated.

Misa gave a nod, then fished for her bag and pulled it up into her lap, opening it up. She pulled out a few envelopes, already slitted open, and with her name and an address on the front of them all; she put them across the table from her, as near to Light as she could manage from where she was sitting. After a moment's hesitation, Light stepped towards the kitchen table and took up the top envelope, winching out the folded letter inside it.

L finally took his weight off the doorframe, coming towards the table too, as Misa fidgeted slightly; Light became immersed in the letter, reading it with a mixture of bewilderment, horror and anger.

When he was done reading, he looked up at Misa, who met his gaze, her eyes huge and conflicted. He could say nothing, though – not even protesting when L rather forcefully snatched the letter from his hand to read it himself.

"You were still in a coma at the time," Misa said finally, "but when I started fronting the campaign, I gave a press conference explaining what I was doing, even in the face of the murders, and gave my reasoning for why I support _Death Note_."

"Because it would look nice and shiny on your filmography?" Light asked waspishly.

"_No_." Misa shook her head. "Look, your books… Well, _Death Note_, anyway… it really spoke to me, Light. You see, my father was a politician, quite low down at first, but he was a good man and cared about laws and motions that benefited everyday people. He got promotion upon promotion and raised in ranks and several other politicians got jealous and thought his ever-increasing position would oust them from theirs, or that he might expose their crooked schemes, so they set him up and had him arrested on false tax fraud charges. He was sentenced to fifteen years in prison, even though he was innocent – but then, in the second year of his imprisonment, he was stabbed by another inmate and died from the wound." Her voice had grown smaller and was beginning to waver. "My father was murdered in prison – and he was _innocent_! He shouldn't even have been in there! It was just the jealousy and greed of other politicians that sent him to his death. And then, my mother… three years ago, the pain became too much for her, and she hung herself. As for the politicians, they got away with lying about the crimes they said my father had committed. It made me so angry, but then… your book, _Death Note_, came out. When I read it, it made me happy, because I felt as though someone – _you_ – understood my pain and had written a revenge for me. That's why I expressed such interest in the lead female role in the movie, FBI agent Naomi Misora. I wanted to be a part of it. And then, the murders…" Misa gave a little sigh. "I don't know if it was simply chance, but the second politician to be murdered was Noriaki Asahina – one of the men who had had my father put in prison." She shook her head hopelessly. "A-and I know it's _wrong_, but… but I couldn't help but be glad, glad that he was dead, glad that your book had started coming true—"

"My book is _not_ coming true!" Light exploded. "Ms Amane, do you have _any_ idea what you're saying?! _Condoning_ these murders—"

"I know it's wrong!" Misa cried, standing up abruptly, "but I can't help it! He was part of the reason that I lost _both_ of my parents in less than four years! And I did some research on the other murder victims, and they've all been in the news at one point or another because of some scandal or scam – the murderer isn't killing good politicians. He's only killing corrupt ones, just like the murderer in the book!"

"That doesn't make it alright!" Light gestured furiously to the letter, which L was holding limply. "And when did you start getting letters like these?"

"After I gave that press conference." Misa's demeanour had become rather defensive.

"You mean," L said blandly, "after you as good as admitted that you supported the murders."

Misa looked at him.

"I _didn't_ say that."

"You implied it, no doubt – just as you have to us. You may have your reasons for doing so, Amane-san, but it's obvious that you do support the murders—"

"And she's not the only one," Light finished icily, picking up another of the letters. "You've become a front for this… _belief_, it seems, Ms Amane."

"I agree that this particular letter is a cause for concern," L concurred flatly, holding up the one in his hand. "Here we have a message which clearly articulates that the individual who wrote this believes that _all_ people who are considered to be corrupt and of a less-than-benevolent disposition – shall we say – should be killed for the sake of "bettering the world". I'm going to assume, since you brought more than one letter, that more than one person has sent you such a correspondence detailing exactly the same notions. And _you_, Amane-san, appear to have become, as Light-kun so kindly pointed out, a front or spokesperson for this campaign."

"I didn't incite that belief," Misa said coldly, "if that's what you're attempting to insinuate."

L shook his head.

"I made no such insinuation, Amane-san – but it cannot be denied that these people have looked to you to impress their own personal beliefs upon." The detective glanced at Light. "Frankly, I'm surprised that you haven't received similar letters, Light-kun."

Light threw down the letter he'd been reading in disgust.

"I'd _glad_ that I haven't," he said icily; he glared at L. "And _you_ said that my books _weren't_ inspiring people to—"

"They aren't," L interrupted wearily. "These people, venting their frustrations to an actress, are on a completely different page to our killer." He looked again at Misa. "Amane-san, how many of these letters have you been sent?"

"Maybe… somewhere between thirty and forty, I think," Misa replied after a moment's thought.

"Do you still have them all?"

"My manager does." She gestured to the ones on the table. "I took those five without him knowing."

"Do you have a contact address or number for your manager?"

Misa delved back into her bag and hunted around in it, finally pulling out a little white card from an interior pocket of it and passing it across the table to Light, who glanced at it briefly before handing it to L. It was a typical contact card, stating simply _Touta Matsuda, Acting Agent and Manager_, with a phone number and office address underneath.

Misa turned her attention back to Light as L examined the card.

"So… would you rather I stopped the campaign?" she asked quietly. "I would never want to do anything against your wishes."

Light gave a weary nod.

"Yes, I would," he replied. "Whether you intended for other people to share your personal view of the murders or not, I presume you only came here to ask me my opinion because the situation has escalated into… well, _this_."

He gestured towards the letters again to further exemplify his point. She gave a little nod and looked down at the surface of the kitchen table.

"Well, you're in luck, Amane-san," L said cheerily, breaking into the awkward silence. "I'm not going to arrest you – not today, anyway."

Misa's head shot up as she looked at him in surprise.

"You… you can't think that _I'm_ the murderer!" she said sharply, clearly shocked.

L merely shrugged.

"You have a motive, if nothing else," he said. "Please don't be offended – I hardly mean it as a reflection of my impression of you as a person. I am merely examining the situation logically."

The young actress seemed rather offended nonetheless and, after another long moment, rose.

"Well, I think I have intruded on you long enough," she said somewhat stiffly, looking fixedly at Light. "Thankyou for listening to me."

"Oh, I…" Light hesitated, then cut in front of her as she made her way around the table. "Please, let me show you out."

"That's very kind of you." She followed Light across the kitchen; but paused in the doorway, glancing back at L. "The vintage look went out of fashion six months ago," she said icily, making him look up at her lazily. "You should accessorize a little, or at least go for a different colour – yellow, maybe."

L smiled sourly at her.

"Why, thankyou, Amane-san."

She gave a little snort and flounced away after Light.

"You are _really_ good at pissing people off," Light barbed on his return to the kitchen.

"Well, I _did_ implore her not to be offended," L sighed in reply, sinking into a seat at the kitchen table. "Frankly, I didn't dislike her, really. I'm impressed that she seems to know who Dick Tracy is. _And_ she knew some rather big words."

"Don't be a jerk," Light said, his tone brittle; he sat opposite the detective at the kitchen table and buried his face in his hands, falling silent.

"Light-kun, please don't concern yourself with the content of those letters," L said at length.

"But it _is_ my concern," Light groaned quietly. "It's _my_ book that cultivated the belief that we should adopt some Draconian system that punishes any and all wrongdoers with death. I don't _want_ "Kira" to be hailed as some of kind of Old Testament God—"

"It's not quite at that stage yet."

"Those books… I wish I'd never written them. I know I don't even remember doing it, but I wish that I'd never had the inspiration or the ability to write…"

"Please don't behave like this, Light-kun," L said impatiently. "Don't be afraid of books that _you_ wrote. Don't blame them. Don't damn them. They're just stories – nothing more."

"That's alright for _you_ to say!" Light snapped, raising his face to look balefully at L. "You're a detective! You're used to stuff like this! I'm not, and, on top of that… no matter what you say, I _am_ partly to blame for this. I know I am."

"That's rather an overestimation of your own importance, don't you think?"

"_L_—"

"Oh, Light-kun, _please_." L started to go through the pockets of his trenchcoat. "After all, far be it from me to take all this anything but seriously, but frankly, I don't think you're handling all this the right way. Maybe it's just because you don't possess the "detective mindset", but you are both intelligent and logically-minded. I firmly believe that you are letting this whole thing bowl you over because it's easier for you to deal with it that way." He pulled out a packet of cigarettes, put them down on the table and went back into his pockets in search of a lighter. "Let me tell you a little something about the "detective mindset", then – though you _should_ know all about it, being a detective writer. I believe that it was Poe who, in writing of Dupin via his nameless narrator, referred to the detective's deductive ability as a result of a "diseased intelligence", but even if that has basis – which it may do, morbid as it sounds – the truth is that detective fiction is, as we have discussed, formulaic. And the detective mindset – even of a _real_ detective – is formulaic, too. It's a logical process, pure and simple. Additionally, I am of the belief that the great detective and the great criminal are, in fact, two sides of the same coin. Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty were, in some respects, mirror images of one another."

"What does that have to do with _anything_?" Light spat.

"Well, it all becomes the same thing. No matter how detective fiction changes, it runs by the same formula – crime, investigation, reveal. Detective and criminal effectively spar with mindsets that, pertaining to the crime in question, are opposite but mirrored. _Balanced_, if you will." L finally located his lighter and put it on the table, too. "Dupin or Dick Tracy… Justice wins over in the end. And I suppose… what I'm trying to say is that your book alone could never have _created_ that mindset in someone. Detective fiction doesn't make detectives, Light-kun – nor does it make murderers."

"That's nice." Light reached over the table and snatched away the packet of cigarettes before L could grasp it. "Don't smoke in my apartment!"

"Oh, I apologise," L said morosely. "I suppose I should have asked if you had a problem with it."

"You _know_ I have a problem with it! In fact…" Light crushed the box, cigarettes and all, in his fist. "Don't smoke at all. It's bad for your health."

"Light-kun, you should have been a doctor."

"I _mean_ it, L." Light leaned over and tossed both the cigarettes and the box into the bin. "Stop smoking."

"Some women find it sexy," L said idly, looking at the ceiling.

"Tch, yeah – they did in the _forties_." Light gave a snort. "Besides, even if they _didn't_ realise that it gave you cancer, it wasn't "sexy" back then either. How the hell would kissing someone who's just inhaled a whole load of smoke be in _any_ way "sexy"?"

"So Light-kun would only kiss me if I didn't smoke," L deduced mockingly, smirking at him.

Light's face flushed red.

"Th-that's not what I meant—"

"Oh, you're not much of a Tess Trueheart, anyway," L interrupted lazily, getting up. "Right, well, I'm going to leave you to your reading, then, Light-kun."

Light blinked at him, rising himself.

"Where are you going?"

"To see Amane-san's manager. I want those letters."

Light folded his arms.

"I thought you might be thinking what I was thinking," he replied levelly.

"And that is…?" L prompted, looking at him curiously.

"That there might be a letter from the murderer themselves."

L nodded, smiling grimly.

"See, you _do_ know about the detective mindset, Light-kun," he said airily. He swanned out of the kitchen, Light following him. "I won't bother you again today unless I find anything significant in the letters – otherwise I'll be back tomorrow morning, and I'll bring them all with me so that you can have a look at them yourself."

"Alright." Light opened the front door for him, leaning against it as L stepped out into the corridor. "Oh, and, by the way, L…"

L glanced at him, his expression curious once again.

"If you _do_ turn up here tomorrow wearing yellow," Light said with a faint grin, "there's no way I'll be seen _dead_ with you."

"Oh, I don't think that's likely."

"What isn't? You wearing yellow or me not being seen dead with you?"

"Well, both, but as much as I dislike yellow…" L tilted his head at him, fedora tipping slightly. "…You aren't a politician, Light-kun."

* * *

He may not have remembered being a writer, but he knew exactly what "pathetic fallacy" was – and this was exactly the kind of situation he'd have applied it to:

The rain outside was torrential. It had been raining for a while and showed no sign of stopping, lashing against the glass of the kitchen windows with a harsh, brittle, ongoing sound. Light sat at the kitchen table, cooling cup of coffee next to him and with his chin resting on the palm of his left hand, turning the pages of his handwritten manuscript with the right. It was somewhere between half past eight and nine at night, and he was done with _Poison Pen_ and almost a third of the way through _Death Note_. His tired mind tripped on words that were familiar – _too_ familiar – and he felt a growing sense of frustration welling within him with every paragraph. He couldn't see how Misa Amane had drawn comfort from these pages – the banality of the murder mystery formula robbed him of too much of his patience for him to be anything other than irritated by Ryuk's investigation.

Maybe it was just because he'd already read _Death Note_ twice since losing his memory, or maybe it was because he _knew_, subconsciously, that he had written the book, but he was under the impression that wading through the words for a third time was doing nothing but blunting his ability to draw any deeper meaning from the text itself.

So his misery made pathetic fallacy out of the rain.

At the bottom of page one-hundred-and-twenty-two, Light sighed and sank to the table, resting his forehead on the hard surface and closing his eyes – and when he did so, all he saw against the dark canvas of his eyelids were words, floating, flashing in odd, muted colours, barely legible…

But words nonetheless.

He leaned back again and opened his eyes, looking upwards at the ceiling of the kitchen. Though, as before, he didn't remember writing his books, he was inclined to believe that he had, and so wondered what had made him decide to write them at all.

When he'd been younger, he'd wanted to be in the police. His father had been Chief of the NPA. Maybe it had simply been a case of childish parental loyalty, but he'd wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and be a police detective just like him.

So why write detective _stories_ instead?

Was it because it was easier? Because laying pen to paper and writing a clean-cut fantasy world in which evil was so much more effortlessly vanquished than in reality was less painful? Was it because, in being a detective writer, there was a greater sense of power over the events of the story, over the components that made up the case? After all, he wasn't trying to solve the mystery – he was crafting it. It was omnipotence over everything. He decided who would be murdered next, and how, and when they'd be found. He decided what clue the detective would find – a torn fragment of a tie or a bloody fingerprint or a bullet. He decided the murderer's methods and reasons and eventual fatal mistake. A puzzle to everyone else – his characters and his readers – but not to him, for it was _he_ who had scattered all the pieces out of place.

He wasn't a part of the story. He was beyond it. In that sense, he was God.

So was that it? Was it that he hadn't wanted to be a part of detective fiction, and instead be the one who controlled every element of it?

(And, knowing that he couldn't write reality, had this simply been the next best thing…?)

Light rose from the table and left the kitchen, papers and coffee exactly as they had been; he stepped silently through the apartment to his bedroom, flipping on the bedside lamp to illuminate the darkness a little.

L had called Dupin, creation of Edgar Allan Poe, a "prototypical" figure of the detective fiction genre. He meant that every other fictional detective had, in some way, been modelled on Dupin – or, at least, modelled on detectives who had been modelled on Dupin and so forth.

It was true that, despite not remembering having created Ryuk, on rereading both _Poison Pen_ and _Death Note_, Light could see similarities with and traits from other fictional detectives – the ones which he'd read about as a child.

The box was still there on top of the wardrobe. He stood on the bed to reach it, clutching it to his chest as he stepped down onto the floor. The top layer of books and comics was dusty, making him cough a little as he set the cardboard box down on the carpet and knelt next to it, resting the small of his back against the bed.

He'd gotten rid of a lot of his detective fiction collection when he was about fifteen or so, since it had taken up a lot of space, but he'd kept his favourite books and comics, and realised now that these had probably provided a lot of the source material for his own detective stories.

Most were Japanese language reprints, but some were imported from both America and Britain and were thus in their original language of English; he had an English-language copy of _The Big Sleep_, one of the Philip Marlowe books by Raymond Chandler, printed sometime in the 1960s, pages yellowed and cover battered. He took it out of the box, looked at it briefly, then put it on the floor before removing a stack of detective-themed manga comics to dig further into the box. He found an Agatha Christie book, a copy of Ian Fleming's _Casino Royale_ and two or three _Batman_ graphic novels, all translated into Japanese, before uncovering an omnibus of 1940s _Dick Tracy_ comic strips, reprinted in the 1990s but in their original English.

Dick Tracy himself was on the cover, gun blazing, firing at a 1940s-style hooded car making a speedy getaway from him down some narrow, dank little sidestreet. Light wiped away the film of dust on the glossy book cover, taking note of the immense similarities between Tracy's typical 40s PI garb and the outfit L wore. Despite the fact that L's was predominantly grey and black, the old-fashioned buttoning on the trenchcoat, the style of the stitching and even the way the fedora sat on Tracy's head reminded Light of L.

There was something rather unsettling about L, the way he looked and dressed, standing out in modern society like an OTT caricature of a detective exactly like Dick Tracy – and Light felt it even more now as he looked down at the omnibus cover, then flicked through the book. It was as L had stepped right out of these pages. There was no other way of putting it. Even Misa had noticed it, making that snide little comment suggesting that he should switch to yellow.

He stopped at a page depicting a full-body rendition of one of _Dick Tracy_'s most infamous villains – The Blank.

The Blank wore conventional 1940s clothing – trenchcoat, fedora, the works. The name came from the fact that The Blank had no face. It had come out, during the original Chester Gould run of _Dick Tracy_, that it had been a mask, but Tracy had battled with The Blank for years, often coming close to finding out his true identity but always, ultimately, one step behind.

…_That_ was a recurring theme in detective fiction too, wasn't it? The detective finding an arch-nemesis in someone, usually the most enigmatic and capable criminal they had ever come across, and pitting themselves against them in an ongoing battle of wits…?

Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty. Batman and The Joker. Dick Tracy and The Blank.

But _L_… Okay, so maybe he was going too far again, to attempt to line up reality with the rules of detective fiction, but while L seemed exactly like the kind of cookie-cutter detective figure who _would_ find himself an enigmatic arch-nemesis whom he could never quite catch to pit himself against, Light was also reminded, somehow, of L when he looked at The Blank:

In many ways, the mask of 'L' was just as unrevealing. Light could profess to know no more about L than Tracy knew about The Blank on these pages. He'd already puzzled it over, but L seemed as much a prototype as Dupin – or, at least, modelled on detectives who had been modelled on Dupin and so forth.

Light picked up a Japanese-language copy of _The Hound of the Baskervilles_ and held it side-by-side with the _Dick Tracy _book.

L fit somewhere between these.

Light gave another frustrated sigh and dropped both books to the floor. This wasn't getting him anywhere – and what difference did it make, at the end of the day?

He'd said it himself: Six people were still dead.

It didn't make any difference if L was some freaky physical embodiment of detective fiction, or if Misa Amane believed that the murderer was right, or if Light remembered writing those books or not.

Six people were dead, and still they'd gotten nowhere.

There was a knock at the door. In the silence of the apartment, punctuated only by the rainfall, it made Light jump. Heart hammering, he paused, then slowly rose; shaking his head, inwardly telling himself to get a grip, he left the room and went to the front door.

He hesitated, hand pausing on the latch for another long moment, before he took a breath and opened the door quickly—

It was L.

"I…" Light stared at him in surprise. "Wh-what are you…? I mean… How are you not wet?"

L shrugged.

"Waterproof?" he answered nonchalantly around the white thing sticking out of his mouth.

Light's amber eyes narrowed.

"Is that—?" he started.

"A cigarette?" L finished boredly; he took hold of it and removed it from his mouth, holding it up for Light to see. "No, it's a lollipop. Strawberry." He put it back in his mouth. "Is this the part where you tell me that I shouldn't eat sugar because it's bad for my teeth?"

"I…" Light shook his head in disbelief. "Look, never mind that. What are you doing here? Did you find something of significance in the letters?"

L shook his head and stepped into the apartment without an invitation.

"_L_!" Light snapped, shutting the door behind him and leaning against it. "Why are you—?"

He was interrupted by the telephone ringing. Light looked sharply at it, shrilly demanding his attention from its place on the table in the hall – then looked at L.

L nodded at it.

"I think you'd better get that," he said quietly.

Light blinked at him, then slowly went to the telephone and picked up the receiver, bringing it to his ear.

"Hello?"

"Yagami?" came a brittle voice on the other end of the line. "This is Mello. We met this morning."

"Oh." Light was a little taken aback, glancing over his shoulder at L, who simply shrugged. "…Yes, I remember. What can I do for you?"

"Well, don't mistake this for a token of friendship or anything," Mello snapped, "but there's something Matt and I would really like you to see."

Light felt his heart sinking.

"…What is it?" he asked softly.

Mello gave an impatient snort.

"Another body, of course. This _is_ a murder case."

Light silently took down the address Mello gave him and hung up; he couldn't bring himself to look at L, who was standing behind him in equal hush.

"You knew," Light said stiffly, fidgeting with the little piece of paper in his hand. "You knew that there'd been another murder. That's why you're here."

"I also knew that Mello would call you. There was no point in me saying anything."

"_How_ did you know that Mello would call?" Light demanded, finally whirling on him. "Tell me, L."

"Because," L replied calmly, taking the lollipop out of his mouth again to examine it, "let's just say… that the murderer has finally gotten bored."

* * *

All who complained about L smoking in place of eating sweets, complain no more! Light has managed to break his habit!

On the downside, the weirdness just gets weirder – and the storyline crosses over more and more with the real _Death Note_.

And now there's been another murder.

Oh noes!

_Code Geass_ voice-actor naming ahoy: "Noriaki Asahina" comes from Noriaki Sugiyama, voice-actor of Rivalz Cardemonde, and actual _Code Geass_ character Shōgo Asahina (though I guess you could argue that he also shares his name with long-suffering Mikuru Asahina from _The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya_).

Okay, so… um, I hope you enjoyed the chapter, I hope that the next update doesn't take as long!

RR

xXx


	5. Philip Marlowe

Ah, I know I've kept you all waiting a while, so in order to get this chapter to you ASAP, I admit that I actually only finished writing it today. I did reread it to weed out any mistakes that I came across, but I may have missed some, so… apologies in advance for any hilarious situations arising from words either misspelt or missing altogether.

(Ironically, Microsoft Word has underlined 'misspelt' in red. However, it also underlines 'mispelt' in red, so it seems that I am doomed to misspell mispelt however I spell it. O.o)

Thankyou to all who reviewed the last chapter: **Myu-dono, Gabi Howard, greatstars, ZoneRobotnik, Dahlia Franks, yellowrose87, Black-Dranzer-1119, SeraphChronoMage, gemenin001928, -Red Angel-Blue Angel-, ddz008, ?, Gone and Forgotten, Vera-Sama, PikaNecoMico, teito13, bookenworum, badwolf5, Kazutaka-kun, TheDarkWingedAngel, OneWhoSitsWithTurtles, Scripta Lexicona, Deus3xMachina, NX-Loveless-XN, Star Jinin, Danny Phangirl, K, realityfling18, Retrophilic, Tainted Ink and Paper **and **Kuro Shinzo**!

_So_… this chapter is kind of fun. I think.

;)

V - Philip Marlowe

"—_And it keeps on getting weirder…" Mello muttered, slamming down the phone with more force than was necessary._

_Matt, across the desk from him, glanced up from his laptop in puzzlement._

"_What's wrong?" he asked, reaching for the cigarette slowly burning itself into oblivion in the ashtray to his left._

"_Oh, where do I begin?" Mello groaned, leaning his head back and massaging his forehead with his fingertips._

"_With the first phonecall?"_

"_First phonecall," Mello repeated wearily. "Okay. I called up that Yagami guy's agent, Teru Mikami, just to check out his story. Couldn't tell me much – seems like he's kind of crazy, to be honest. Wanted to know if I would be interested in buying a second edition print of 'Death Note', if he can get the publishing deal to go through."_

"_Did you ask him about the accident?"_

"_Yeah. He said it was a pretty standard car accident, as far as he knew – but he gave me the hospital's number and the name of the doctor who oversaw Yagami's recovery after the crash." _

"_Second phonecall?" Matt prompted, drawing on his cigarette._

_Mello nodded._

"_Right," he said. "Doctor Mizushima. He said it was a pretty standard car accident, pretty standard head injury, pretty standard mild case of concussion…"_

"_What about the memory loss?"_

"_He said that's a little more puzzling – the kind of memory loss Yagami has sustained is unusual, given that he hasn't lost most of the details of his past, nor is he unable to formulate new memories, but… has completely lost all memory of anything to do with him being an author. Mizushima said that…" Mello paused, frowning. "…It's almost like Yagami doesn't __**want**__ to remember it." _

_Matt blinked._

"_What, like… he blanked it out on __**purpose**__?"_

"_Something like that, I guess."_

"_Is… is that even possible?"_

_Mello shrugged._

"_I have no idea," he muttered blackly. "I'm not a fucking psychiatrist."_

"_Well…" Matt frowned, chewing on the end of his cigarette. "…Okay, third phonecall?"_

"_Oh, yes. __**That**__." Mello grinned, but the expression was icy, utterly humourless. "This is really where it all just starts getting too perfect… I thought I'd check up on that detective – you know, the one who was carting Yagami around with him like some kind of must-have fashion accessory."_

"_L," Matt supplied lazily._

"_I know what he __**called**__ himself!" Mello snapped. "But listen to this: I called up Interpol, their head office, you know, to find out when this L guy had been assigned to this case which __**we**__ also, as agents from Wammy's House, were assigned. Well, I wanted to know how long he'd been here, who he was assigned by, stuff like that. And Interpol…" Mello gave a bitter little laugh. "Well, Interpol said that they had no record of a detective called 'L' at all – and that no-one aside from us, as far as they knew, had been assigned to this case. You know, not including the NPA." _

"_So… is he with the NPA, then?" Matt asked._

"_That's what I thought," Mello replied tersely. "He didn't look Japanese to me, but I thought maybe he was just based in Japan and was either affiliated with the NPA or had been approached by them as a private detective to take on the case. So I called the NPA, but __**they**__ didn't have any record of him either."_

_Matt blinked._

"_Who the hell __**is**__ he with, then?"_

"_That's what __**I**__ want to know," Mello growled in response._

"_Did you try Scotland Yard? He sounded British to me, and he seemed to know about Wammy's House."_

"_Tried them. Nothing. I also tried the ICPO, the CIA and the Police Nationale. No-one knows anything. I thought of calling the FBI or MI5, but I get the feeling that their response would be the same. It's almost like…"_

"_It's like he doesn't exist," Matt finished, meeting Mello's gaze. "…Well, as a __**detective**__, anyway."_

_There was silence. Matt dragged on his cigarette again, perhaps for a lack of anything else to say. Mello simply stared at him through the smoke, picking up a pencil to irritably tap it on the tabletop. _

"_Detective fiction it ain't," the blonde finally murmured. "Nothing falls into your lap around here." He dropped the pencil again and abruptly got up, heading over towards the kettle sitting on one of the low shelves of their small, temporary office. "Coffee?"_

"_I still have some here."_

"_Matt, you made that coffee two hours ago." _

"_I…" Matt tried the coffee, made a face and disgustedly put it down again on the desk. "Yeah, sounds good, if you're making some."_

"_I am." Mello unceremoniously poured milk and a spoonful of instant coffee into two cups and filled the kettle. Waiting for it to boil, he turned his attention to the window, pushing back the blinds. "It's fucking tipping it down out there."_

"_Well, at least we don't have to go out," Matt replied, reaching the end of his cigarette and stubbing it out with precise poise. _

"_Mm," Mello said; but it went unheard, drowned out by the sudden strident knocking on the door to their office._

_Matt glanced at Mello, who was busy pouring hot water into the coffee cups whilst looking with narrowed eyes at the door; the redhead rose and went to it, opening it. A young, uniformed Japanese police officer was standing in the corridor, panting a little, evidence of the fact that he had hared down here as fast as he could._

"_Detectives," he gasped, "I was… sent down here by… the director. He said… that there's been… another murder!" He fished in his pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper with an address scrawled on it, handing it to Matt. "Here's the address… Forensics have already gone down…"_

"_A-alright…" Matt gave a nod. "Thanks." He shut the door and turned to Mello. "Mel—"_

"_I heard." Mello had folded his arms. "Are we to presume that this just fell into our laps?"_

_Matt gave an uneasy shrug._

"_No idea, but either way…" He gave a nod towards the window. "It means we have to go out there in __**that**__." _

* * *

"There he is," Matt said, pushing off from where he was leaning against the car.

"That detective is with him again," Mello muttered.

"I can see that," Matt replied grimly. "Still, first things first."

"Right." Mello gave a morose nod of his own, raking his soaked hair back. "That little kid's corpse."

—

"Thanks for coming so quickly," Matt said by way of greeting, covering for Mello's sulky silence. "Sorry about the awful weather, but this is kind of… urgent."

Light nodded.

"No, I understand." He was drenched through, and rather pale, but determinedly reined in his anxiety. "Please, lead the way."

"Very well," Mello snapped, finally speaking; he beckoned sharply as he turned on his heel and stomped away over to line of police tape threaded between several of the trees. "The killer's MO has altered – the victim wasn't a politician, the murder wasn't made to look like a suicide and the body was dumped out here as opposed to being left in the place where the murder occurred. It's fairly typical for murderers to dispose of their victims out in woodland areas like this, but since this a complete change in the murderer's behaviour—"

"But…" Light interrupted, but then trailed off as he stopped; they had stepped over the police tape at this point and were making their way through the dense, dripping trees, Mello in the lead. "I apologise, but… it doesn't sound like it's the same murderer at all. Are you sure this isn't just another unfortunate murder victim that—?"

"Oh, no," Mello cut in, looking back at him. "It's the same murderer all right, Yagami. You'll see for yourself." He turned away again. "Come on, it's not much further now."

Light glanced uneasily at L, who merely shrugged. Light looked away once more – he wasn't sure if he was on speaking terms with L right now, in lieu of his cryptic behaviour. Something about this just didn't add up at all…

"Hey, move over!" Mello demanded of the forensics team, all of whom were in their white overalls, clustered around a certain small area; he batted at them as though they were a pesky cloud of horseflies and they duly scattered, regrouping a little way away, still making notes on their clipboards as though they hadn't just been chased away from the object of their attention.

"There," Mello went on, his voice short as he thumbed towards the body of the seventh murder victim.

The corpse was very small, soaked through and on its back on the woodland floor. The eyes, huge and dark, were wide open, sightlessly staring at the canopy of gnarled trees hanging overhead. There was quite a lot of blood, and it stood out against the white canvas that was the child's body.

A little boy, dressed all in white, and with hair and skin to match.

"We're not sure how he was killed yet, nor do we have an identity," Mello said flatly, his lifeless tone a striking, harsh contrast to the mixed feelings welling up inside Light as he looked at the dead boy.

(Horror and hatred and anger and disgust and nausea—)

"That sounds like the ambulance," Matt said of the wailing siren, which grew louder and yet served to make the silence between the four of them more prominent still.

Light hadn't been aware that he was shaking, but the violent quivering of his body became obvious to him when he felt L's still hand come to rest on his shoulder; it did nothing to comfort him, however, and he shook him off angrily.

He didn't know what to say.

"Yagami," Matt said finally, "we appreciate that this is upsetting for you, but we wanted you to see it—"

"Why?!" Light burst out. "Do you think I don't feel guilty enough as it is?! You thought I didn't care enough about some politicians being murdered because of my books and thought you'd see how I took a little kid being killed instead?!"

"Don't be so ridiculous!" Mello snapped. "I appreciate that you're giving the body your full attention, but that's not why we brought you here." He gestured to an area slightly beyond the boy, darkened by the density of the trees. "_That_ is."

Light followed the direction of his hand. The wet ground Mello was pointing to was decorated by a wide scattering of small, white rectangular things, limp and disfigured by the rain. From here he could just about make out that those closest to him had print on them…

Pages. They were pages from a book, all torn out and thrown to the ground.

"Can you guess which book those pages belong to, Yagami?" Mello asked in a hard voice.

But Light wasn't listening to him. He stepped away from all three detectives in silence, making sure to keep away from the child's corpse as he moved towards the pages. Standing directly over a few of them, he looked down at the paper and was able to read the warped words, recognising them as his own.

_Death Note_.

He couldn't help it. He knew he shouldn't disturb a crime scene, but he couldn't _help_ it; he lifted his foot and slammed it down on one of the wet pages, twisting it, angrily grinding the paper into a muddy pulp.

"Hey!" Mello appeared at his side, grabbing him by his shoulders and stopping him. "Forensics hasn't finished with this area!"

"_This isn't what I wrote_," Light whispered in reply – though he spoke, really, more to himself.

"Well, someone wrote something," Mello said tersely, beckoning to Matt. "And they wrote it to _you_."

Matt joined them, clutching something in a clear plastic bag, which he had recovered from the forensics team. He wordlessly handed it to Light, who didn't want to take it but was compelled to anyway.

"It was in the boy's hand – probably put there by the murderer," Matt said. "Forensics removed it before it was ruined by the rain."

Light looked at it through the transparent plastic – it was the jacket of the book, empty, having had its pages torn out and strewn over the forest floor. It was a little damp but didn't appear defaced in any way, the picture and blurb and title and author name all as they should be. He turned it over—

"Hardly fan-mail," Mello muttered of the hand-written message scrawled on the inside of the cover.

_My Dearest Kira, Tell Him I'm Near._

Light read it over and over, unable to make any sense of it – having no idea what was meant by it, nor why every word began with a capital, nor why it was in English.

"Tell who… that _who_ is near?" Light asked quietly, looking up again. "That the murderer is near, or that the little kid is near, or…?"

Matt shrugged.

"We hoped it might make a little more sense to you," he admitted, "but obviously not."

Light shook his head.

"I don't know what it means," he said. He had begun to shake – more than before, almost uncontrollably, whether because of the cold or horror or fear, he didn't know. "I don't know what it means," he said again, blindly pushing the cover back at Matt, at Mello, whoever would take it.

"Hey, what the hell is up with you?" Mello asked sharply, folding his arms, as Matt finally took the book jacket.

Light didn't say anything; he looked up at L, who was still standing several paces back in complete silence. Light didn't want him to say anything, but wanted to know why he wouldn't—

"Yagami!" Mello snapped, his tone more demanding.

"I-I'm sorry," Light whispered; but his attention was arrested by the space between the blonde detective and his redhead partner, through which paramedics diligently trooped, weighed down by equipment.

He couldn't help but watch with disgusted, detached interest as two of them knelt beside the little boy's body and checked him over – before one beckoned for a body bag.

That was that, then.

"It's just," Light went on dully, "…I didn't write this."

* * *

"Why won't you speak?"

"Because you don't want me to speak."

"I do now."

"So I am."

Light said nothing to that, shutting the front door by sinking heavily against it. He was soaked through and shivering but thought little of it, every last square inch of his imagination filled with the stale image of the dead child, and of the message to _him_.

L, equally drenched, with the brim of his fedora drooping a little, stood before him in the hall. He didn't seem uncomfortable from being so wet, but even though he'd joked earlier about being waterproof, it would have been ridiculous to expect that he'd be dry after being out in rain that torrential.

"I'll stop again, if you want," he said at length. "If Light-kun wants me to be silent, I won't say anything."

"I-I don't know. I don't know what I want." Light pushed away from the door. "Right now, I just… I don't know."

"Light-kun, that child's death was not your fault."

"It _was_!" Light burst out. "It was because of those wretched books, because I _wrote_ them! The killer… must want my attention, or—"

"No, the killer wants you to pass on a message."

"To _who_?!" Light demanded frustratedly. "To… to a politician? To… I don't know, Mikami? It can't be Misa, the note specified "he", but—"

"Or," L interrupted calmly, "was it meant to be written from the point-of-view of the child?"

"As in… the child was near the killer?" Light frowned. "I guess… he must have been, if he was murdered—"

"No, forget using the word as a preposition," L said, cutting into Light's speculations for a third time. "Try using it as a noun – a proper noun."

"…Near? Like… his _name_ was Near?"

L shrugged.

"Maybe," he said airily. "Light-kun," he went on, abruptly changing the subject, "no child was ever murdered in any of your books. That is correct, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Light sighed. "That's… that's why I said I didn't write it…"

L nodded, more to himself, apparently sinking into deep thought right there in the hallway, dripping all over the place.

"Excuse me," Light said tersely, walking past him. "I'm going to change."

"Go ahead."

Light didn't thank him for the "permission", wordlessly passing him to get to his room, shutting the door sharply once he was inside. The sound of the rain lashing against the window was magnified by the dark silence of the room, dirty city glow leaking in through the glass and lying crumpled on the bed like an abandoned shirt, the narrow slats of it speckled with the shadows of the raindrops clinging to the windowpane.

The sight of it suddenly depressed him – the plummet aching even as he stood there, unmoving, looking at his empty bed.

He flipped the switch next to his hand, filling the room with a cleaner, brighter radiance, and covered the bed with his detective fiction collection, taking the books and comics from the floor and strewing them haphazardly across the sheets, filling the absent space that it hurt him to look at – perhaps because the expanse of neat white sheets reminded him of the boy, stained white by death, his eyes sightless and empty.

When he was satisfied by his montage – putting more effort into it than was necessary, overlapping and fanning them perfectly, wiping a little dust off the front cover of Raymond Chandler's _The Big Sleep_ – he went to the wardrobe and opened it, pulling out some dry clothes. He pulled off his wet things, glad to get them away from his skin, replacing them with the fresh garments. His damp skin was still a little sticky, but he felt much better for the change of clothes, the thick sweater stifling the shivers out of him.

He didn't quite want to go back out to L just yet, and, in glancing idly around the room in search of something to distract himself with, found himself settling his attention on the desk pushed up against the far wall.

_Is that where I…? _

He went to it, resting his hands flat on its cool, hard wooden surface, trying to imagine laying a blank piece of paper upon it and spilling out words, hoping his hand was fast enough to pin them between pen and paper.

He couldn't – or, rather, he _could_, but knew that it was imagination only, and did not draw remotely from his buried memory.

He pulled back the chair and sat in it; reaching across the desk for the mug filled with pens and pencils. He settled for a blue ballpoint, leaning back in the chair deftly twirling it between his fingers. A portion of the manuscript of _Death Note_ had been written in blue ballpoint. Was this it? Was this the pen that had spewed those awful words all over that hateful page?

(Which was more to blame – pen or paper?)

No. He couldn't blame the tools. He couldn't blame the fifty yen ballpoint. He couldn't blame the notebook – _any_ of the notebooks. They might have been used by anyone for anything. The ballpoint could have been bought by a man on his way to the office one morning and used for taking minutes at a business meeting. Any of his notebooks could have been bought by a schoolgirl and used as a diary or a homework planner. It was not what they were, nor even who used them.

It was how they were used.

And _he_ had used them to create something monstrous.

He put the pen back – it didn't feel familiar in his hand, and he was uncomfortable holding it. Instead he leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling for a long while, blindly running his hands along the edge of the desk. He paused as his fingertips came into contact with the shape of a key, hard and cold, jutting out from the lock on the drawer. He dropped his gaze to it, idly turning the key this way and that, listening to the bland rhythm of clicks.

Finally he unlocked the drawer and slid it out. He couldn't remember for the life of him what he might have put into it, and so had no idea what he would find.

There wasn't much in there. A few more pens, a collection of rubber bands, a pad of Post-It notes, some colourful paperclips and a book of stamps. He wasn't sure if he was disappointed or not – wasn't sure what he'd been _hoping_ to find.

He shut the drawer, not bothering to lock it again, and rose, starting towards the door. He stopped, however, halfway across the room and looked again at the deliberate collage he had made of his bed – his optical ode to detective fiction.

The book closest to him was _The Big Sleep_, perfectly positioned slightly on top of the bottom right-hand corner of his _Dick Tracy_ omnibus. His copy of _The Big Sleep_ was fairly old, printed in English, the cover typical of pulpy reprints from the late 1950s and early 1960s, with a corny tagline in garish font beneath the title declaring "PI Philip Marlowe: He always gets his man, he always gets his girl!"; a low spectrum of colours and a grainy print job giving questionable life to Marlowe himself, rendered in that comic book quasi-realistic style. He looked rather dull next to Dick Tracy in his vibrant yellow, instead wearing the stereotypical brown of the fictional hardboiled detective, but despite the difference in colours, it was clear to see the similarities between the clothing they wore – the shape of the fedora, the buttons and belt style of the trenchcoat.

It reminded him more than ever, looking at that old, battered copy of _The Big Sleep_, that L was half a century behind as far as detective fashion went.

He went back to the wardrobe and opened it, going through it and pulling out a few more garments; putting them folded on the bed right over _The Big Sleep_ before finally leaving the room.

L was still standing in the corridor, leaning against the wall close to Light's door, his arms folded. He was still soaked through – of course.

"Hey, you'd better change," Light said flatly. "I left you some of my clothes on the bed – you can wear them until yours are dry."

L looked up at him with a wry smile.

"Light-kun seems very determined to get me out of this attire," he observed. "Does it bother you so badly?"

"Do you _mind_ not trailing water all over my apartment?" Light retorted waspishly, evading the question. "Go and change, for god's sake!"

"Alright, alright…" L smiled lazily at him and followed the direction that Light was pointing imperatively in, going into the bedroom and only half pulling the door shut behind him.

Light irritably shut it properly, under the impression that L had left it ajar just to annoy him.

He sank down against the door to wait for L, curling into a sitting position with his back against it, his arms wrapped around his knees. Even though L was only on the other side of the door, Light found that he suddenly felt very lonely, and clutched at himself for comfort, trying to push the image of the little boy – _Near_, as L had called him – out of his head. It was more difficult not to think about it now that he didn't have anything to distract him – and that included L. It wasn't that L was the greatest example of company Light had ever had the fortune of being in, given how annoying he found him, but on the other hand… he had to admit that he _did_ feel quite comfortable with him. He didn't know what it was about the detective, because on the other hand he found him to be infuriating and slightly untrustworthy, but somehow he felt like he _knew_ him. He didn't know from when, or from where, or even _how_, but there was something about him that was so familiar that Light felt at ease with him even as he thought of him as suspicious.

L was fairly taking his sweet time. At first Light didn't mind, rather content to wait for him sitting against the door, but, after what must have been about ten minutes, he found himself getting up and giving the barest of knocks before abruptly opening the door, not caring if L was only half-dressed or not.

He was, in fact, fully-dressed in the clothes Light had left for him, the reason for his prolonged period of time in the bedroom being that he was enthralled by Light's detective fiction montage, standing at the foot of the bed in silence, looking at it. He turned to Light, however, as he entered the room – Light blinked at him, stopping, the sudden difference in the way he looked taking him by more surprise than he would have expected.

The clothes he had left for the detective had been simple – just a long-sleeved white T-shirt and jeans – but Light couldn't help but feel…

…that this was how L was _meant_ to look.

"What's the matter, Light-kun?" L asked pleasantly, rubbing at his damp hair – wilder and spikier now without the fedora to push it down.

"You…" Light gave a little shake of his head. "You look… so different."

L shot him another wry smile.

"More modern, certainly," he agreed. "Is Light-kun satisfied now?"

"I… just didn't want you to be wet," Light muttered defensively.

"Yes – it appears that I am not as waterproof as I first presumed."

"I wouldn't have expected that you were."

"What a shame that your expectations govern my reality." L glanced back at the books littering the bedsheets. "You have some good books here, Light-kun."

"Oh, I…" Light felt a little embarrassed about the way that he had arranged them now that L was looking over the whole thing like some kind of art critic. "I just put them there to keep them off the floor. I-I was looking for something earlier…"

"You are perfectly entitled to arrange your reading material however you like," L replied genially. "I think I'd prefer a shelf, personally, but that's just me." He reached out and picked up _The Big Sleep_. "How ironic," he murmured. "Our murderer seems rather intent on administering doses of the Big Sleep, hm?"

"…If you want to put it that way." Light's amber eyes narrowed as he watched L turn the book this way and that. "Don't wreck my book, L."

"I'm not – I'm just interested. This looks like it's rather old."

"Early sixties, I think. _Maybe_ very late fifties."

"Mm. It looks authentic. Might only be a second or third edition – _The Big Sleep_ was first published in 1939. Depends on how quickly it sold out. This copy has a great cover, though."

"You think so?" Light frowned at it. "It looks the part, I guess, but that tagline kind of annoys me."

L looked at it himself and smiled.

"It was the style at the time. It does seem a little boastful, though – even if Marlowe _does_ always get his man and his girl. Honestly, he rather puts us real detectives to shame."

"Well, I hope _you_ get _your_ man, and I hope you do it quickly," Light replied bitterly, going to the window. "Every time I think of that poor little boy…"

"Light-kun, I'm as sickened and angry as anyone about the fact that a child was killed for the sake of passing on a message, for we'll assume that the child would not have been made a victim otherwise, but I won't have you blaming yourself, either."

"But I—"

"Because even if you _do_," L interrupted calmly, gently tossing the book back onto the bed, "it won't change a thing. The child is still dead. The murderer is still out there—"

"And I _still_ wrote those books," Light finished, leaning his forehead against the windowpane.

"Even _burning_ every copy in existence wouldn't do any good now, Light-kun," L said. "Nothing can be done except for the capture of the killer."

"Then why don't you _do_ it?!" Light snapped, whirling on him. "You, or those Mello and Matt guys, or _someone_! I don't want there to be another body, L! I don't want someone else to die because of me, whether… whether they debatably deserved it or not!"

"Light-kun, it isn't that simple," L replied patiently. "Don't be so ridiculous – you _know_ that."

"Why would _I_ know that?!" Light retorted. "Because I wrote some silly stories about a character I made up? You think that implies that I know how these things work in reality? _You're_ the one being ridiculous if you think that! If only it _were_ true, if only I could put a stop to all this simply… simply by _willing_ it to stop, then that would be perfect, but—"

"Ah, yes," L interrupted with a sour smile, "if only reality bent to your desire as easily as I did." He gestured to his simpler clothing as he spoke.

"You look better. You should stay dressed like that."

L gave a sigh.

"You seem to rather have it in your head that my usual behaviour and attire is incorrect," he said. "I find that very strange – most people _picture_ a guy in a fedora and a trenchcoat who smokes and hangs around in bars at 2am drinking malt liquor when they think of a detective. Well, that, or Sherlock Holmes – but we can't all be Sherlock Holmes, you understand." He looked down at himself again. "But this, Light-kun… _this_ is abnormal. I don't look at all like a detective now."

"Oh, and a _fine_ job you were doing when you looked the part," Light spat in reply. "Perhaps you'd make a better anomaly. Perhaps then you might get closer to catching the killer."

"Don't be unfair, Light-kun. This isn't an easy case."

"I know that, but you…" Light gave a sigh of frustration. "You said when the killer got bored, when he changed his method… That was when you'd get him, and yet… here we are still. That poor little boy is in a body bag, no doubt lined up for an autopsy, and the murderer is still free to lay out Body Number Eight for us."

"With all due respect, the child's body was brought to our attention only a little over an hour ago. I didn't imply that the murderer would walk straight into our outstretched arms the moment the MO altered."

"Then why are you here?" Light hissed. "Don't you have _work_ to do, Mr Real Detective?"

"Why am I here?" L tilted his head at him. "Because you want me to be."

"You sound pretty sure of yourself," Light said coldly.

"I suppose I am," L agreed, "but please don't think it's arrogance. I simply know that it is the truth. You don't want to be left by yourself."

"I—"

"It's understandable that the death of the boy would have upset you, Light-kun. There is no need to be ashamed of it."

"…And is _that_ why you're here?"

"I'm here because you want me to be," L said again. "That is my understanding, anyway. Of course, if you would prefer to be left alone—"

"No," Light interrupted wearily, suddenly feeling both defeated and relieved all at once. "Stay. Even though I admit I find it weird… that you just seem to do whatever I say, I'm not saying it as simply an order."

L gave a nod; and, after a moment, returned his gaze to the books upon the bedsheets.

"What were you looking for?" he asked. "You said you were looking for something."

"Oh…" Light looked at the scattered tomes himself. "To be honest… when I was rereading _Death Note_, I couldn't help but notice… that a lot of Ryuk's traits are borrowed from other fictional detectives, and it just reminded me… well, I guess I just wanted to look at my sources."

L smiled.

"Oh, yes, I have to say," he concurred, "that you _did_ shamelessly steal a lot of things from other works of detective fiction."

"Shut up," Light snapped, coming to join L at the foot of the bed. "This coming from the guy who prefers to dress like Philip Marlowe?"

"Hm. Too bad I don't have his luck." The detective was referring to the cheesy tagline again, no doubt, but Light didn't rise to the bait.

"L," he said.

"Yes?"

"…You _are_ going to get him, aren't you? The murderer?"

"Of course I am, Light-kun."

"Okay. Because I don't want him killing any more children."

"That's a good reason," L said airily, "but do you mind if I ask you something?"

"What?"

"Well, I assume you are so affected by the death of the boy, whose name we agreed might be 'Near', because he was real. You said that a child had not been a murder victim in any of your books, but… would you have ever _considered_ writing it?" L paused. "That is… would you ever have condoned the murder of an unreal child for the sake of plot advancement?"

Light glared at him.

"How the hell can you ask me something like that?" he bit out.

"Because it is an important question. Please answer it."

"I… I don't remember. L, you _know_ I don't remember writing those books—"

"That should not prevent you from answering the question. Even if your memories are limited, surely your opinions have not changed."

"Oh, god… I… maybe…" Light shook his head. "I don't _know_, L!"

"It is a common practice in modern crime and detective fiction. Killing children, I mean."

"I said I don't know!" Light screeched.

"Don't shout at me, Light-kun," L sighed. "There's no need to get upset about it."

"There's perfect reason to get upset about it!" Light blazed, suddenly grabbing at the copy of _The Big Sleep_ and wrenching it open. Without a moment's hesitation he tore it in half, straight down the centre of the flimsy spine, and threw both halves onto the bedroom floor. "I hate them! I hate all these horrible stories about people being murdered over money and jealousy, children being killed by sickos with childhood traumas of their own, and I hate the way the deaths only facilitate the plot!" He reached for a Japanese-language copy of an Agatha Christie book and started to rip that apart was well. "I hate the people who write it, I hate the people who read it— God, L, I _hate_ detective fiction!"

"Stop it, Light-kun." L grabbed his wrist as he disposed of the Christie book and reached for a _Batman_ comic. "I know you're angry, but this isn't going to solve anything."

"Why don't _you_ solve something, then!" Light snapped, trying to wrench his wrist back. "Like the fucking mystery!"

L said nothing, just looked back at him in silence, still clutching the younger man's wrist.

Light could feel himself beginning to shake again, wracked with a coldness that slipped past his senses and settled instead in the cores of his bones – feeling that the cause of it might be the emptiness of L's eyes, so much like those of the dead boy. He felt his knees give out and sank against L, comforted by the contact in its simplest sense.

"Just put me out of my misery," he murmured against the detective's shoulder. "I don't want to be haunted by it anymore…"

L still didn't say anything; but Light thought that the strange control he seemed to have over L must stretch beyond words, for what he wanted was a distraction, something to encompass his consciousness so wholly that he could dwell on nothing else, least of all the image of the dead boy nailed to the wall of his mind—

And L kissing him seemed distraction enough.

What he wanted was something that stopped him – stopped his thoughts, stopped him from remembering why L was here at all, _stopped_ him… the way he wished that it _all_ would stop.

(And wishing that it all would stop somehow felt familiar.)

As did L. Even though Light knew that he'd never met L before, he couldn't shake the feeling that he _did_ know him from somewhere, even if it was only from the page of a book. _This_ was that much more intimate than even curling up under the covers with a tome and a torch, making a private little book-club of Holmes' adventures or Marlowe's rash methods.

The rhythm was not as neat as words but was easier on the mind than a story. The bedsheets were still covered with the books he had not destroyed; littered with detective fiction, the edges of them leaving imprints in his skin, making him marked by it, just as he was dominated by the very embodiment of it.

It made him – or all of it – no more or less real, and made him hate detective fiction no less, even when he cried detective fiction's name.

* * *

When he woke, it was still raining. He didn't think he'd been asleep for long, for it was still dark. L was asleep next to him, his jet hair messier still.

Light didn't know what to say to him and hoped he didn't wake, although tried his best not to disturb him anyway as he slipped out of the bed and pulled on his jeans and shirt, leaving the latter unbuttoned.

He was drawn back to the desk. It was as though there had been a storm in his skull, the overbearing heat before it preventing him from formulating thought clearly – but now, in the aftermath of the downpour, the gears of his mind turned better in the cooler, fresher atmosphere.

It wasn't that a whole memory had come back to him, rather a mere fragment – but a fragment that had not been in his possession before.

He sat in the chair at the desk as before and, again, reached for the blue ballpoint. He unscrewed the end of it and slid out the narrow plastic ink reservoir; then pulled out the drawer and slipped the piece of plastic upwards into a tiny hole drilled underneath, levering what had seemed to be the bottom of the tray up.

He knew that there'd be a circuit beneath the false bottom – that was what he had remembered. He'd also remembered that he needed to use the plastic ink reservoir of a ballpoint to keep the circuit from connecting and setting the whole drawer on fire if he wanted to get the false bottom loose.

He had no idea what he would find beneath it, though.

It was another notebook. He reached in and carefully lifted it, sliding it out of the drawer and looking at it. Touching it brought back nothing, and nor did staring at it, and eventually he resolved to open it.

It was filled with pages of his own writing, small and neat. The words did not tell a story, as he had thought they might on first glance, but were instead notes.

Notes on what seemed to be a… character? A detective, perhaps – but not Ryuk—

He turned the page and something slipped out, fluttering to the floor. Frowning, he put the notebook on the desk and bent for the folded sheet of paper, picking it up. It was thin and flimsy, which wasn't surprising, given that it was a newspaper cutting.

He carefully unfolded it, beginning to read it. It was an article about a murder case which still lay open twenty-five years after…

…after the little boy's body had been found in the woods on the Halloween of 1979.

Light looked at the photograph. It was grainy, a reprint of one taken a quarter of a century ago, but there was no mistaking it.

L. It was almost ironic how often he referred to himself as a "real detective".

He wasn't – in fact, he wasn't even real at _all_.

He was nothing but a character created from the corpse of a child:

Detective fiction incarnate.

* * *

Guest-starring Nate "Near" River as The Corpse.

…Ah, it sucks. I love Near, and would have preferred to use him in a more dignified manner, but, hey, I have my reasons, nonetheless.

As for the rest… kyah ha ha, I have nothing to say, but if you've read some of my other stuff, you should know how much I love my crazy, wacked-out, that-barely-makes-any-sense plot twists.

So if I can get one into a story, I am a happy bunny.

I am a happy bunny right now, yes sir. :)

Doctor Mizushima: Named after Takahiro Mizushima, voice-actor of _Code Geass R2_'s Rolo Lamperouge (also the voice-actor of Romeo in _RomeoxJuliet, _FYI).

So, um, more soon (I hope)?

RR xXx


	6. Ellery Queen

Yeah, yeah, it's like I've been dead for ages, and then I suddenly reappear again and start updating everything in sight. Sorry for the delay – although this hasn't had as long a hiatus as _The Ghost in the Machine_ had.

Thankyou to: **ZoneRobotnik, teito13, Kazutaka-kun, PikaNecoMico, badwolf5, SeraphChronoMage, Teldra, Silver Ice Rain, Gabi Howard, Marie Ravenclaw, ravensbbf, MoonGun, milleniumthief, toolazytologin, ftwtf, Star Jinin, SonzaiTaz, Lady Kiome, Tainted Ink and Paper, bookenworum, Judith, Vera-Sama, Danny Phangirl, HallucinatingDreams, Keyines, Clennie, Scripta Lexicona, Deus3xMachina, Shikabane-Mai, rein hitomi, RandomFreakazoid, Jack, OneWhoSitsWithTheTurtles** and** Midoribon**!

I just finished ploughing through the abundance of reviews for _Inversion Pt II_ of _The Ghost in the Machine_ and I know that a lot of you guys read that as well as this (hurrah for me finally remembering almost all your pen-names!), so, yeah… Thankyou for your reviews and I'm glad you liked it! Hope you enjoy this update just as much! :)

…Okay, so, some of you got what I was getting at with the end of the last chapter and some of you didn't.

If you didn't, don't worry. I shall beat you over the head with it right now.

;)

Ellery Queen

L woke up because Light wanted him to.

That was entirely the thing. The issue. The problem.

"What's the matter, Light-kun?" L asked as he sat up in bed. He seemed very at ease about the whole thing – waking up in Light's apartment in Light's bed not wearing Light's clothes.

Not that Light exactly had it in him right now to be affronted or insulted or embarrassed or whatever else. He simply stood at the bedside for a long moment, looking down at L, tight-lipped and white, the notebook clutched in one hand. He wasn't surprised, frankly, that _L_ didn't have it in him to be any of those things, either. In fact, he wondered exactly how far L's spectrum of emotions actually stretched. He _did_ seem rather 2D, to be perfectly honest.

"Light-kun?" L asked again, tilting his head.

Light angrily threw the notebook at him.

"Read it," he snapped. "Every word of it."

L blinked at him in surprise, but obeyed. Of _course_ he obeyed. Light didn't think he had much of a choice. If Light told him to go throw himself in front of an articulated lorry, he'd probably go and do it right this second.

Although… the sheer ridiculousness and incredibility of it all aside, it _did_ make several things make a lot more sense.

Sort of.

Light sank onto the edge of the bed as he watched L read. The detective's eyes had widened a little but otherwise both his expression and his body language remained unchanged – he even gave a little nod of understanding when he came to the newspaper cutting.

"It would appear to me," he said at length, finally looking up at Light, "that I am actually not a real person."

Light nodded. He wanted to laugh even though he didn't actually think this situation was remotely funny.

"That's how it seems," he agreed. "Stupid. It's stupid, isn't it?"

"Oh, I don't know about that. You've got one hell of an imagination, Light-kun – I'll give you that."

"But you're not in any of my books!" Light spat. "You're not even _mentioned_!"

"Look, let's start at the top." L unceremoniously dropped the notebook to the bedsheets and folded his arms over his raised knees, looking directly at Light. "To be honest, I don't really like to admit it, but you having invented me – that is, my existence being a mere figment of your imagination—"

"No, that can't be right!" Light interrupted. "Mikami and Misa… and Mello and Matt…! They could all see you and talk to you and…!"

"I did not imply that I exist only in your head," L said patiently. "As you have pointed out, that is obviously not the case. What I meant was that I seem to exist only because you imagined that I do – and what I was _going_ to say was that, though it's somewhat depressing for me to admit it, my existing being down to you actually makes several things make sense."

Light nodded cautiously – it was, after all, exactly what he'd been thinking himself.

"If you must know," L went on, "I actually have very little memory of anything that I've experienced outside your presence. I can't recall anything that might have happened to me before this case."

"Wh… why didn't you _say_?!" Light burst out incredulously.

L shrugged.

"You never asked."

"But… but didn't you think that was _strange_?" Light pressed, stunned. "This whole time you've been fussing about _me_ being an amnesiac, but you actually don't have any memories of your own prior to about a month ago?"

"I don't think it's that I don't have any memories," L said morosely. "I rather think it's that I don't have any _experience_. I suppose what I'm trying to say, Light-kun, is that I don't think I actually even _existed_ until this case began. Well…" He tapped the notebook. "Aside from in here, of course."

"But that doesn't add up," Light argued. "The case… well, the first murder occurred about a month ago, but I was in the car accident _three_ months ago." He picked up the notebook himself and waved it savagely at L. "I wrote this _before_ the crash, so why the two-month delay between my creation of you and your manifestation in the real world?"

L shrugged.

"That I cannot answer," he said, "but there is one thing that is, unfortunately, consistent with your agreement that you did indeed create me."

"I never said—"

"It is obvious. These notes describe me very well." L reached across to where Light was brandishing the notebook in midair and plucked out the newspaper clipping from between its pages, swinging it between his thumb and forefinger. "It is not uncommon for authors to be inspired by things that they experience – either in their own lives or things they see on the television or internet or read in books or whatever. Let us assume that you came across this newspaper article sometime before your accident and thought that the story of this unfortunate murdered child would make an interesting basis for a new detective character – perhaps for your fourth book, of which you have written four chapters to date." He ran his finger underneath the grainy photograph. "It is true that this looks very like what _I_ might have looked like as a child. I have to hand it to you, Light-kun; I accused you of not being above stealing things from other examples of detective fiction, but this idea is fairly innovative. A detective character who is in fact a murder victim himself—"

"Shut up!" Light put his hands over his ears in a childish 'I'm-not-listening-to-you!' display, dropping the notebook. "It's awful! I shouldn't have done it!"

"Well, it's done, and here I am." L let the cutting flutter back to the bed. "To digress further from the point, you being my author explains a thing or two, certainly. You thought it was odd that I just seemed to do everything you told me to? I even stopped smoking because you told me not to do it. Do you see, Light-kun? It injures my pride, but it seems that you have complete authority over me. I can't help but do what you tell me to do. Or _not_ do, as the case may be."

"I…" Light descended into thought, lowering his hands. There was something else… "When you showed up earlier," he said carefully, "you weren't wet even though it was raining outside. It's probably… because I didn't expect you to turn up, so therefore I didn't expect you to be wet. However, when we went out to see the boy's body, you got soaked – because I _expected_ you to. You even said it yourself – that it was a shame that _my_ expectations govern _your_ reality!"

L nodded gravely.

"Though I don't think that I didn't get wet because I'm waterproof," he muttered. "It's more likely that I was never out in the rain that first time to begin with."

"Then where were you?"

L shrugged.

"I don't know. However, we shall assume that I cater to your whims, Light-kun. You probably wanted me to turn up."

"I did not—"

"Perhaps not consciously, but it _was_ there. It must have been. Frankly, I believe that you must be capable of controlling my actions even without speaking. For example, tonight…" L arched an eyebrow in amusement as he watched Light flinch a little. "Well, I don't think you're actually attracted to me, and you have certainly never verbally announced anything of the sort. But earlier… what you wanted was a distraction. You were so distraught that you wanted something to dominate you so completely that you could forget all about it. You can deny it if you want, but the truth is that I didn't force myself on you. I'm pretty sure I was complying with what you wanted me to do – even if it was a subconscious desire. Don't you think it all seemed rather sudden?"

"Be quiet," Light snapped. "As if I don't regret it enough already. Not only did I sleep with a guy – I slept with a guy who isn't even _real_!"

L shrugged.

"Neither of those things are my fault," he said pleasantly.

Light was silent for a long while.

"There's one more thing," he said at length. He picked up the notebook once more. "These notes describe you as… well, how you were when you first turned up. You know, trench coat, fedora, smoking, all that jazz."

"Am I not consistent with it?"

"No, you are… well, you _were_ at least, but… that's entirely the point." Light shook his head. "You didn't match up with my _perception_. I kept expecting you to do things that aren't in these notes… That is, I expected you to be the way you are _now_. But why is that, L? If this is how I wrote you, why did I wake up after that car crash expecting you to be different?"

"I couldn't say. Perhaps you simply changed your mind about how you wanted me to be."

Light shook his head at L incredulously.

"You're very calm about all this," he murmured. "You just found out that you're not even… well, that you technically don't _exist_, and yet you just kind of shrug and nod and agree that it makes everything make sense."

"What can I say? It's not that I had an _idea_ that I was a fictional character of your creation, exactly, but… I did think that a few things were a little bit odd. You were relentless in your pursuit to change me and I obeyed without even thinking about it, really. Either your authorial hold over me is very strong indeed or you simply wrote me without much of a spine. I'm more inclined to believe it's the first option, since I don't seem to be the type who takes orders from other people."

"Except from me."

"Except from you. Still, perhaps it's fitting that I exist solely because of you. They call you 'Kira', derived from the Japanese pronunciation of the English word 'killer', and I am a character derived from the unsolved twenty-five year old newspaper story of a murdered child. Whether I was born that night or indeed only three months ago, it is fair to say that L exists because of Kira. I am here because of you, Light Yagami."

"And what about the murders?" Light asked in a low voice.

"I was getting to that. You managed to divert me from that point some time ago, actually." L gave a quiet little sigh. "I can say for sure that you aren't going to like what I'm about to say, but you recall that I said that your acceptance that you created me was consistent with something?"

Light gave a cautious nod.

"Well," L continued, "your acceptance is an admission that you have the power to make fiction reality. I have no idea how you are able to do it, and I expect that you don't either. Is it the notebook? The pen? Or is it simply _you_, Kira? Is it purely you that has the ability to change the world with written words?"

"I-I don't—"

"They were rhetorical questions, Light-kun. However, would you agree that that is the case? If you don't accept your power then we'll never get anywhere."

"I…" Light clenched his fists. This really was all just getting too weird; but there seemed to be no other explanation. L wasn't real – and yet he was. "I suppose, for now, I have no other choice but to believe it," he bit out finally.

"Excellent – we have progress. Now, if we agree that you invented me and made me "real", so to speak, then by default it is likely that you are able to make other aspects of your fiction reality too. Light-kun, please do not be offended by what I am going to say, but the thing is… I think that you may in fact be responsible for the copycat murders after all."

The words hit Light like a gut-punch despite the fact that he'd kind of been expecting L to say them. His fists clenched tighter on the bedclothes, almost burning, but he couldn't say anything.

"Not personally, of course," L went on, filling the silence. "But we have to consider that there has been no trace of the murderer at any of the crime scenes – no forensic evidence whatsoever. It's almost like they don't exist. Do you not think it is possible that you could have created the murderer exactly the way that you created me?"

"I…" Light looked down at the bedsheets. The thought of it was almost too horrible to consider – but L had a point. "The murderer of _Death Note_ was called Taro Kagami. You think maybe he…? No. Wait." He looked up at L again sharply. "Kagami used the notebook to kill the politicians – he forced them to commit suicide. The character would never have killed with his bare hands, but that's exactly what's been happening with the copycat murders. The politicians have been murdered and the deaths have been made to _look_ like suicides. If Kagami had been made real like you, then he would only kill if the Death Note had been manifested into reality too. It's not like I remember writing the book, but I gather that much from the character. He was too cowardly to kill with his own hands."

"Very good, Light-kun," L muttered, looking up at the ceiling thoughtfully. "However, that doesn't let you off the hook. I have never been in any of your books. We'll assume that you created me with the intent to write me into one of your future novels, but as it stands, I have never been used. It is possible that the killer is another character which you have imagined but never written."

"There's nothing else in this notebook," Light said sharply.

"That isn't the only notebook you have."

"How do I know _you're_ not the murderer?" Light spat.

L gave a thoughtful nod.

"It is true that I have no alibi," he said. "However, you did not create me to be a murderer. Whether you are responsible for the killings or not, we have reached an agreement that you are responsible for _me_. It is likely beyond my power to be anything other than what you write me as." He gave a sudden sour smile. "Just try not to be too rough with me when you're playing God."

"This isn't a joke, L," Light said coldly. "If the murderer really is a fictional character who can just disappear into thin air, how the hell are we going to catch them?"

"It certainly does make things trickier," L agreed. "And it's definitely true that some murderers are never caught, real or not." He gestured to the newspaper article as he said it. "However, will you allow me to put forward another theory?"

Light shrugged. He wasn't sure if he really wanted to hear anything else, but on the other hand figured that he didn't have much to lose by listening to L at this point.

"How kind," L said dryly. "Very well, consider this: The alteration in the killer's MO came after I said that an alteration in the killer's MO would help us to catch them. Now perhaps I am jumping to conclusions, but I am almost certain that either you were the one who put those words in my mouth _or_ agreed with them after I'd said them, even if you didn't voice it. This is why I believe that you are responsible for the killer's existence – you seem to have a certain amount of control over them. I, your creation, say that the killer's MO should alter and, lo and behold, the killer's MO alters."

"If I have such a great level of control over them, why the hell did they start killing in the first place?!" Light bit out.

"Because you wrote them that way, I expect." L frowned. "Well, either that, or you _wanted_ them to start killing. I really don't know. Maybe this is simply how you alleviate your boredom, Light-kun."

"I would never—" Light began disgustedly.

"I wasn't done with my earlier point. Don't you think that tonight… was rather a matter of history repeating itself?" L tapped the newspaper article once more. "It was so similar to this that it can't have been a coincidence. That child – _Near_ – even had the same eyes as me. This might just be grasping at straws, but… I think that it is possible that that little boy wasn't real either."

"All of the other victims were real," Light said stiffly. "You heard what Misa said – one of the first to die was one of the politicians who framed her father."

"But none of the others were found with a message in their hand especially for you." L exhaled deeply. "I expect this isn't doing much to ease your guilt, but I honestly don't believe that Near ever existed before he was murdered. Well, at least not outside the pages of one of your notebooks."

"Do you really think that, L?" Light asked sullenly.

"It's a possibility. Just when you think that it sounds crazy, I would remind you that you _did_ invent _me_."

"If it really _is_ all… No." Light shook his head. "All it means is that you were wrong to say that I shouldn't blame myself. It seems that this _is_ all my fault."

"I apologise. I will, of course, take it back. I am sure that you will agree with my wish, however, that I didn't have to."

"I can never write again," Light said miserably. "If this is what happens…"

"Yes. Perhaps your amnesia is fortunate after all."

"_Amnesia_…" Light's head snapped up again. "L… what if I brought my memory loss on myself?"

L frowned at him.

"As in… you think that you might have purposefully orchestrated that car crash?"

"It's possible… don't you think?" Light got up, pacing restlessly as he thought. "If I can make fiction reality through what I write, then maybe I wrote that I'd get into an accident that cost me my memory. After all… the only thing I can't remember is writing my books. If I wanted to forget—"

"That does make sense," L interrupted levelly, "but the question is _why_. Why would you do that? The first murder didn't occur until around two months after your accident, so it's not like you wanted to forget that."

"I-I don't know." Light gave a sigh, stopping. "Maybe… maybe something else I wrote became real and I just didn't want to remember it. It seems very much like I went to great lengths to hide some things from even myself." He nodded towards the notebook on the bedsheets. "_That_ was in my desk drawer, but it was beneath a false bottom rigged to blow up if it wasn't opened in the right way."

"What made you remember?"

"I'm not sure… I woke up after… after we, uh… you know…" Light couldn't meet L's gaze. "And for some reason I could… just _remember_ how to open the drawer."

"Perhaps it was your contact with me," L mused. "That might sound silly, but I _am_ your character. Maybe your intimacy with me reminded you."

"…Maybe."

"I'm not trying to entice you back into bed. It's just a thought."

"I'm sorry," Light sighed. "It's not… it's not your fault. It's just kind of… weird. I'm not gay, but even if I was…" He looked at L desperately. "You're a fictional character that I _made up_! It's not just that I slept with you, it's this whole thing… I didn't think things like this were even _possible_, and now…"

"Well, perhaps this is exactly why you wanted to forget your stint as an author in the first place," L said, looking up at the ceiling.

"How can you not be bothered?!" Light burst out. "You don't seem to mind at all that you're not a real person. Aren't you… God, L, aren't you _angry_ at me?"

"Of course not. If it wasn't for you, I wouldn't exist at all." L looked back at him, his black eyes unreadable. "Besides, perhaps you simply did not write me with the capacity to be cast into a downward spiral of self-doubt and agonising confusion at the prospect that I am, in fact, spawned from your imagination. If you think I'm a little bit… _2D_, shall we say, then you have no-one to blame but yourself. Still, I suppose it's a little ironic that I kept calling myself a "real detective" when I am, in fact, nothing of the sort."

"Mm." Light met his gaze for a moment, offering him a sad little smile. "I'm sorry."

L shrugged.

"I'm here now, either way."

"I can see that." Light looked over L's shoulder at the alarm clock on the bedside table. It was almost midnight. His gaze followed the slow descent of the second hand around the circular face for a long moment, mostly so that he didn't have to look at L.

And then, as he looked at it, something dawned on him. He reached for his watch; without even looking at it, his fingertips found the dial at the side and he clicked it once, twice…

On the fourth time, the bottom compartment suddenly slid out. He looked down at his watch, aware that L had turned his attention to it as well. There was a tiny scrap of paper secured under the bars of the watch's bottom plate. Light hooked one of his fingernails underneath it and winched it out – on the underside was a single word, written in Light's own neat blue-biro kanji.

_Woods_.

"Hey," Light said, raising his head. "Get up and get dressed."

"You remember something?" L asked, looking at the tiny scrap of paper himself.

"I'm not sure what," Light replied, "but I know where to look. Come on, get dressed."

"What do you want me to wear, Light-kun?"

Light faltered.

"Wear whatever the hell you want," he bit out finally. "Just do it quickly."

He walked away from the bed, turning his back on L, and went to the window. It was still raining. He looked down at the little piece of paper again – a clue that he'd left for himself.

This was really turning into some kind of sick treasure hunt that his pre-amnesiac self had laid out, it seemed.

Why?

Light didn't know, but there was one thing that L had said that he couldn't get out of his head.

_Maybe this is simply how you alleviate your boredom, Light-kun._

* * *

"I don't think they're going to find a match."

Matt, cigarette dangling from his mouth, glanced up.

"Come again?" he asked, smoke coiling around his words.

"I _said_," Mello repeated impatiently, meeting his gaze, "I don't think they're going to find a match."

"For what?"

"For that kid." The blonde averted his attention back to his computer monitor. "Blood, DNA, name… They won't find an ID."

"What makes you say that?" Matt asked cautiously.

"Just a hunch." Mello had begun typing. "There was something really odd about him. Don't you think he kind of looked a little bit like that detective who's always with Yagami? You know – the one that doesn't seem to exist."

"E-even so," Matt started, "that's jumping to conclusions—"

"Perhaps, but… this whole Light Yagami thing is just getting weirder and weirder anyway."

"Mello, I know you don't seem to like him much, but the fact that he had a sort of… almost-breakdown when he saw that child's body—"

"It's not that," Mello snapped. "I can understand that completely. He feels guilty about what his books have caused. No, Matt, it isn't that."

"Then what?"

"Come and look." Mello beckoned the redhead over to his side of the desk. "I just figured I'd do a little more research on him. There's all the usual stuff here, his age and his birthday and his marriage eligibility and all the books he's written and the awards he's won, but…" He tapped the screen as Matt leaned closer. "Take a look at this right here."

"Huh…? 'Was questioned… following the death of Kiyomi Takada, a classmate of his at Tokyo University, in 2005…'." Matt frowned, glancing at Mello. "What, did they think he'd _murdered_ her or something?"

Mello shook his head and clicked to open up a previously-minimised window.

"This is the report written following his questioning – I got it from the NPA database. It's not that they thought he _killed_ her, exactly. He couldn't have – she was hit by a car. However, he was the last person to see her alive. It seems that they were a couple, more or less, and they'd had an argument the night she died. She walked out in a rage. It's likely that she was so busy thinking about their argument that she didn't look when she was crossing the road, resulting in the accident that cost her her life."

"What were they arguing about?"

"There's no detail here. Probably some stupid thing. Still…" Mello glanced sidelong at Matt. "The plot thickens. It happened after he'd written his first book. Two months after her death, he publishes his second. Less than a year later, the third one, _Death Note_, appears – and four months after that, Yagami is in a car accident himself, losing his memory of being Kira."

"Do think he remembers _her_?" Matt asked thoughtfully, reaching over Mello to stub out his cigarette.

"I don't know. I don't know if it's even something that matters, but on the other hand… it just adds to the bundle of weird, wouldn't you agree?"

Matt gave a sombre nod, re-reading the information on the screen.

"Well," Mello said, standing and stretching, "sitting around here isn't getting us anywhere, and since they're all still PMSing over that kid's corpse down there, fancy a little roadtrip?"

"To where?" Matt asked suspiciously.

"Over to Yagami's agent's office. I want to talk to that loon in person, see what he _really_ knows about his special little sunflower of a hotshot cash-cow novelist."

"Mello…" Matt looked at him incredulously. "It's practically one in the morning!"

"All the better." Mello gave a wicked grin. "I was totally planning on ransacking his office first."

* * *

"Well, I have to say, Light-kun, that this looks very suspicious," L said drolly, following Light through the damp, dark, muddy woodland. "The pair of us wandering in the woods sometime after midnight with a spade."

"Are you blind?" Light snapped, whirling on him and holding up the "spade". "It's a trowel, not a spade! I have no idea what the hell I buried out here, but I recall that I buried it in the first place with this."

"I hope it's not a severed head," L sighed as Light turned away again. "I'm really not in the mood for dealing with a severed head right now."

"That makes two of us," Light bit out.

"Hm?" There was a musical little lilt to the way L elicited the questioning sound. "You know, Light-kun, despite the fact that we both just realised that I am nothing remotely like a real, normal person, you still treat me as one. It's very kind of you."

Light gave a snort.

"I simply treat you as a thinking being," he retorted. "If you must know, I _never_ thought you were normal."

"Well, this is how you wrote me."

There was something of an unspoken "Nyah nyah" in that, but Light ignored him as he stomped on ahead. It wasn't raining anymore, having petered out to a gentle shower by the time they'd emerged from the apartment block and started walking. Light had put on a coat but L hadn't bothered, padding along after Light wearing his clothes again. He didn't seem remotely interested in dressing up like Philip Marlowe anymore, but Light wondered if it really _had_ been L's choice.

After all, _he_ had rather been hoping that L would go for Option 2: Light's Cast-Offs.

He… he didn't know. He just preferred L in jeans and that white shirt. It felt… more normal, somehow; or, at least, didn't make it so glaringly obvious that he was a "real detective". Ha ha.

He knew where he was going. As he'd said to L, he had no idea what they were going to find, but he knew exactly where he'd buried it – as though there had been a map drawn on that tiny scrap of paper hidden inside his watch for all these months. When they reached the looming, jagged shape of what had once been a huge oak, struck down by lightning several years ago, he knew he had to look east to the nearest large tree, around which thick veins of ivy were laced like a cruel corset.

His grip on the trowel's wooden handle tightened and he went to the tree, kneeling in the sodden undergrowth, feeling the mud beginning to seep through his slacks already. It didn't make him feel any warmer – and certainly didn't do anything to comfort him – but he did his best to ignore it, spearing the trowel firmly into the soggy earth and beginning to dig. L was standing right behind him, hands in the pockets of his borrowed jeans, watching him in curious silence.

Light found that he didn't have to dig for very long, for he had given whatever he'd hidden a rather shallow grave. It was something fairly small, rectangular, not very heavy, wrapped in several layers of plastic bag to keep it safe and dry. He unwrapped it quickly, but he already knew that it was another notebook.

It couldn't possibly be anything else.

"Hey, Kira," he heard L say as he got the last layer of plastic off and held the bare notebook (it was very cold). "What do you think about two people sharing one identity?"

Only it wasn't L that had said it. Clutching the notebook, wide-eyed, Light knew that without even turning around. When he _did_ look, however, he found himself following L's gaze to a space several metres away between two gnarled, dying oaks.

He didn't like to say that it was another L, because he knew (better than anyone) that that wasn't the case. However… there really wasn't any other way of putting it either. The being before them had the same tired white skin and dark eyes and dishevelled raven hair—

And wore loose faded jeans and a too-big long-sleeved white top.

"You know," this strange new L went on, grinning. "Maybe two writers under one pen-name, like Ellery Queen. Frederic Dannay and Manfred Bennington Lee, isn't that right, Kira? You know all about that, of course. You know all the classics, all the tricks of the trade. You do your research – that's why you're such a good author. You come up with great plots and great dialogue and great _characters_…" He tilted his head the way L did. "Only sometimes you come up with good characters and then you come up with _better_ characters and… Well, it really is just too sad to go into, but I'm sure you know what I mean."

He glanced lazily at L, who was completely speechless on observing this sudden grotesque facsimile, and then looked very firmly back at Light.

"Did you tell him, Kira?" he asked in a childish, sing-song voice.

"Wh… That… Th-that you're… _near_?" Light managed to get out, clutching tighter still at the unearthed notebook.

The double nodded, looking at L again.

"I guess you didn't," he said. "He seems very shocked. Are you surprised to see me, L – or didn't you even know I existed?"

Still saying nothing at all, L turned his gaze on Light; but the brunette had his own eyes firmly fixed on the other version of him.

"No, I didn't tell him, because it's not the truth," Light said icily. "You're not Near. You're B."

* * *

"Well," Mello said eventually.

"Well what?" Matt asked faintly as they both stood at the open door of Teru Mikami's office.

The agent himself was slumped face-down over his own desk with a hunting knife sticking out of his back at a perfect ninety-degree angle. There was blood all over him and the desk and the floor.

"Well," Mello repeated grouchily, "I think this could have gone better."

* * *

To anyone who predicted that B might have something to do with all this (and some of you did): Oh dear, am I that predictable? :)

Well, look at that – Light is apparently Haruhi Suzumiya. Actually, that would be a _really_ interesting showdown, wouldn't it? The God of the New World (Light) vs The God of the Current World (Haruhi).

Heh heh, I think my money would be on Haruhi. She would kick Light's ass.

Ironically, the poll on my profile at the moment poses the question of who you think would win in a showdown between Light and Lelouch Lamperouge from _Code Geass_. Lelouch was in the lead for a while but then Light overtook him and was winning by quite a lot for ages but I just checked it and it seems that Lelouch is somehow beating him once again. Personally I think Light would be able outsmart Lelouch. They are quite similar, but Lelouch almost lands himself in it quite a few times. Light is a little more careful – I think L would have caught Lelouch like… immediately. :P

On the subject of _Code Geass_… this chapter actually doesn't have any characters named after _Code Geass_ voice-actors. However, you may recognise the name of the murderer in Light's book, _Death Note_; Taro Kagami is the name of the protagonist of the original _Death Note_ pilot reprinted in _How To Read 13_. Ah, the real character is actually quite nice, I don't think he would have killed any politicians, Death Note or not, but… meh. I wanted to work him in somewhere.

As for Takada… kyah ha ha, this is the first time I have ever actually "used" her in one of my fics. She gets to be a has-been corpse because I hate her. She is like the only _DN_ character that I actually really do hate. She's such a bitch. Misa should have slapped her, totally.

This fic is also the first time I have used Mikami, and unfortunately he had to die. :( Oh well, at least he got to be in it more than Takada.

Anyway… this fic will probably have two more chapters (I think) to wrap everything up, so hope to see you next time! Thanks for reading!

RR xXx


	7. Batman

You know, it's been so long since I last looked at _Detective Fiction_ that I actually didn't realise that it has 200 reviews. O.o

I apologise for the lateness! I have been pretty busy! To some of you this will be old news by now, but in September I upped sticks from Britain and came over here to Cincinnati, Ohio, for a year abroad as part of my degree. So, yeah, that kind of cut back on my writing time a little...

BUT I am now more or less fully-settled and right back to putting fanfiction before everything else in my life, so HERE WE GO!

Thankyou: **Marie Ravenclaw, Gravefire, badwolf5, Plimsoul, Gone and forgoten, ZoneRobotnik, Poison's Ivy, ravensbbf, SeraphChronoMage, Kat, Scripta Lexicona, Ice Rain Mage, Norah, Tainted Ink and Paper, teito13, KhaosKat, PikaNecoMico, Vera-Sama, ?, Deus3xMachina, breadsticks, rianifitria, Lying In An Angels Arms, Damn Expensive Eggs, Gabi Howard, Tanaraza, One percent, Ookami Fuu, Nada1224, ichigatsu, OrangeR0se, Embers of Inspiration, Shebali, TheDustOfJack **and** ChOFee**!

Ah, this chapter... I feel like I'm getting back to my (FFNet) roots a little here. :D

Oh, and also, this chapter was kindly betaed by **4udball**. I was too lazy to reread it myself as I usually do, I am (not so) ashamed to say. She's a great beta. Hit her up if you need someone to kick your chapter up the ass.

Detective Fiction

Batman

"_B_? Well, now, Kira," B crooned, "it's hardly my fault if you can't be bothered to give your characters proper names, now _is_ it?" His idle gaze slid from Light to L and then back again. "Still, it's not as though the trend applies entirely to _me_. Near? _L_? How lazy you are becoming. Really, it's just not attractive in such a successful author. In fact, it's rather disrespectful – to both your readers and your characters. It's unfair that you can't be bothered to name us properly. And _this_..." He plucked at his attire, raising his eyes towards L again in the same motion. "This is just downright shoddy. We're exactly identical."

Light couldn't speak. He had sunk into appalled silence as though it was quicksand and simply staring at B in dismay was doing nothing to enable him to haul himself out of it again. It had been dreadful enough to find that he was responsible – to all intents and purposes – for the string of murders that had been baffling both the law enforcement and the media for over a month now. It had been more terrible still to find that L, far from being the "real detective" that he had always taken such pains to identify himself as, was in fact nothing but words on paper made real.

But _this_...

He looked at B and the horror that seeped throughout him was indescribable. Author, writer, master of words – and yet words failed him.

"Light-kun." L looked at him, his pale face expressionless. "Did you know about this?"

Light said nothing. He couldn't even nod or shake his head. His fingers quivered on the cold notebook clutched in them and L looked down, following the tiny movement.

"He knew," B chirped gleefully. "Maybe he didn't _care_ to know about it – so he took the cowardly way out and wiped it from his memory – but he knew that I existed."

"And we're the same?" L went on levelly, turning his attention to his doppelganger. "You and I? He subconsciously... fashioned me to look like you."

B tilted his head.

"I honestly couldn't say which of us came first," he replied. "Perhaps it is that he fashioned me to look like you. Or maybe... _I_ simply fashioned myself to look like you."

L frowned.

"Why would you do that?" he asked quietly.

B shrugged and grinned.

"Because that's how I was written?"

"And the message that you wanted Light to deliver," L went on carefully. "It was addressed to... _me_?"

B gave a nod.

"Of course," he murmured. "After all, it seems like he's even thrown Ryuk aside too. _You're_ the shining star detective now, L. And I wasn't even sure if you knew I existed, so I entreated Light to pass on the message. But don't be upset. I may have killed those politicians, but I didn't kill that little kid. Near, you know? He wasn't even real."

"If you didn't kill him," L said carefully, "yet you used him to get Light to pass on the message to me, then how did he die?"

B shrugged.

"I guess I'd call it something of a plot convenience," he said. "Maybe I'm not the only one who wanted you to know about me – and I know of only one person who has the power to give life – or _death_ – to someone who doesn't even exist."

L looked again at Light, who was still simply staring at B with his hands wrapped tightly around the notebook. His knuckles were white and he was holding it as though he simply _couldn't_ let it go.

He also said nothing, as though he simply _couldn't_. He was completely frozen but for the quick, desperate rise and fall of his chest as he took in breath after panicky breath.

"_That_," B murmured, nodding towards him, "on the other hand, is probably something that he could never hope to write. He may have honed his craft, may be on every bestsellers list there is, may have movie and merchandising deals piled up on his desk... Hell, he's good enough to lay pen to paper and breathe _life_ into written words, but still... What you see in him now, L, is something too potent for him. He could never hope to write it, for he cannot handle it."

"He could never hope to...?" L trailed off, looking back at B. "I don't understand."

B grinned again.

"_Fear_," he said softly, whispering it like a secret. "No matter how a good a writer is, how could he ever know the fear of a murder victim in the last fleeting moments of their life?"

"And you do?" L replied stiffly, turning towards B properly.

"Of course. Am I not a murderer?" The facsimile held up his hand. "But wait, L – before you judge me, as I know you will, for that is how he wrote you... consider how he wrote _me_. Did I have any choice _but_ to be a murderer?"

L opened his mouth, but B headed him off:

"Oh, I know what you're going to say. You're going to berate me for blaming someone else for the way I am – for saying that my actions couldn't be helped. However, I would maintain that you only think that because that is the way that _you_ were written – nothing I say will sway you from your belief, but that is because it was the only thought process written into your head. You must know it yourself by now – you do what Kira wants you to _when_ he wants you to, and that's all there is to it." He took a sudden few steps towards L and Light, his horrible twisted smile unwavering. "The fact _is_ that he was playing God – and now he'll simply have to suffer for it. Isn't that only fair?"

L stepped in front of Light, placing himself between him and B – the young author still hadn't moved at all, not even his mouth to defend himself.

"Then do you mean to call yourself an _agent_ of God?" L spat.

B stopped but his smile did not.

"Ah, L, I understand your bitterness, although I admit that I am torn when it comes to applying reasoning to it – is it that you are angry that I am right and you know it, or is it because I have admitted to being the murderer? Have I robbed you of your victory by making it too easy?" B nodded towards Light. "Please don't rely on _him_ for anything – even the ending that you would like for yourself. Was it an audience you wanted, L... that is, an awed, silent group of simpletons who revere your talent and sit spellbound as you pace and forwards before them, laying out every clue and how you pieced them all together to reach the conclusion you will now draw back the curtain upon? How very formulaic, how very _safe_... Still, you are as 2D as I and you know it. Of _course_ that was what you wanted. That's all you'll ever want, L. The end. The answer. Nothing else will satisfy you, because you have want of nothing else. You're as empty as the single letter he christened you with."

"Maybe that's true," L bit out. "Maybe's it true that I have want of nothing but the answer to whatever mystery I find before me, purely because that is all _Light_ wants from _me_. However, how then does that apply to _you_, B? If you are capable only of complying with what your author wants, why rebel? Why murder when it only drives him to despair?"

"_Rebel_?" B snorted. "L, don't be so naïve. It made you angry when I said it the first time, but I'll say it again nonetheless: Both you and I can do only what he wants us to do. You're a great detective, right? Isn't that how he wrote you? The world's greatest detective? Then _work it out_!"

"Light-kun..." The thought seemed to have only just occurred to L – or, at least, this was the first time he had truly _allowed_ himself to think about it – but he turned to Light again, wide-eyed. "You... _wanted_ this?"

Light moved. He shook his head. His eyes were still fixated on B, but he answered L's question and shook his head; first slowly, then very violently.

B only laughed.

"That's not true," he giggled. "Maybe now, faced with me, you can't think _why_ you wanted it, but you did. None of us would be here if not for you. Didn't you want to be God, Kira?"

His voice lilted up and down like a seesaw, tripping delightedly over certain words and inflections as if his accusation was a song. Light's white fingers twisted suddenly around the notebook, warping it beneath his terrified grasp.

"Light-kun!" L snapped, beginning to lose his patience with him. "Is this what you wanted?"

"_No_," Light replied hoarsely, suddenly looking desperately at L. "No, this isn't.... this isn't what I... I didn't write...!" He seemed suddenly incapable of holding up his own weight, for he sank to his knees before L and dipped his head and twisted further still at the notebook as though trying to wring out the ink, long-since dried upon its resting-place. "L, I didn't, _I didn't_...!"

Over B's sudden wild giggling behind them, L looked down at Light – always a detective, always with a "Who?" or a "What?" or a "Why?".

"Then what _did_ you write?" he asked softly, his voice utterly toneless.

Light merely shook his head, not really looking at L anymore, instead gasping and shaking and—

"_Light_!" L knocked the notebook out of Light's hands angrily, sending it skipping over itself across the muddy woodland floor.

Light looked up at him with a gasp, as though suddenly breaking the surface of water; indeed, he truly did look as though he had just come out from being under the influence of some form of trance or something, his amber eyes wide.

L glanced uneasily back at the notebook, lying face-down on the grass.

And perhaps it had taken him too _long_ to notice – great detective that he was supposed to be – but it was as his gaze fell upon the plain, unyielding card cover of that notebook that he noticed the sudden silence. Turning abruptly away from Light – who was merely looking up at him desperately, as though waiting for him to whip out the conclusion to the case and make everything that he didn't want to know about go away again – L instead faced B—

And found that B had completely disappeared.

There was no evidence of disturbance, even where the hideous facsimile had been standing; additionally, there had been no sound of movement. L glanced around, but his survey was idle. He expected to find nothing, for he knew that B was gone.

It wasn't that he had left. He hadn't fled the moment L had turned his back on him. It was simply that he was gone.

L looked again at Light. He owed this... _child_ his very existence, but now, as he looked at him – pale, shaking, on his knees and, clearly, terrified of what he and his pen and his notebook had created – he felt a certain spike of frustration. It was so obvious now: Light Yagami had lost his memory because it was the easiest way out.

Did that make him a coward? L bit thoughtfully at his bottom lip as he looked at his creator. He wasn't entirely sure. It was true, naturally, that most authors didn't have to deal with this sort of thing – and Light _was_ very young, to be fair to him. Young and, it seemed, rather naïve. He wrote about murders, about cold and calculating killers, about the very deepest and darkest facets of the human psyche, but, really, what could he honestly know of those things?

No, he wasn't a coward, L decided – but he _was_ afraid.

He had been afraid of B. He had wanted him to leave. So B had.

"Get up," L snapped at him at length, stepping away from him to go and retrieve the notebook. As he bent to pick it up, he heard Light finally rise; he tightened his own grip on the notebook as he glanced back at the boy, determined to hold onto it himself for a while.

For as long as it took.

"So, Light-kun," he said blandly, "since you made a detective of me, let's try this again. What did you write?"

Light looked at him again, and this time his expression did not seem so much fearful as it did suddenly weary and weighed-down.

"I didn't write anything," he replied softly.

* * *

Matt was lighting up his third cigarette, leaning against the wall of the corridor just outside Teru Mikami's office, when Mello emerged from the room, stepping over the police tape none-too-carefully, snagging it a little.

The tiny room was now a hive of activity, with uniformed officers, forensics personnel and a few higher-ups all clustered in there, jostling and shoving and swearing under their breath. It was almost 1:30am and Matt felt their pain. He glanced at Mello, whose gold hair was dishevelled, probably from him tearing at it in frustration. Mello didn't like going through the motions. Paperwork and procedures bored the hell out of him.

"Hey," the blonde bit out. "Inspector What's-His-Face says we can go home and get some rest. Start again tomorrow at 8am."

His clipped tone showed _exactly_ what he thought of that idea, but Matt gave a relieved sigh and pushed off the plaster.

"Sounds like a plan," he breathed, smoke coiling around every syllable. He left the cigarette in his mouth and slung his arm around Mello's shoulders as the pair of them started down the hall. Mello seemed slightly irritated by the action, but, nonetheless, he made no attempt to shrug out of it.

Matt was glad. He was exhausted and needed the support to make it down to the car.

Mello headed straight for the driver's side. Matt didn't complain. He usually drove but he was all for shotgunning right now. He could lean back and close his eyes and finish his cigarette.

When Mello pulled the car out of their space and started going in completely the wrong direction, Matt didn't say anything for a while. Instead he simply glanced at Mello, whose face was miraculously rather expressionless, and eventually rolled down the window to flick out the remains of his cigarette.

"Hey, Mello," he sighed finally, winding the window back up, "we're not going home, are we?"

"Of course not," Mello bit out in reply. "Idiot."

* * *

The apartment was unnervingly silent. It was to be expected, of course, since prior to their re-entrance, it had been completely empty, but the _slam_ of the front door behind them echoed like layers of lace through every room.

L was practically dragging Light, who trailed behind him like a sulky child, his gaze fixed firmly on the ground. He had said nothing all the way home – and _still_ said nothing when L hauled him into the bedroom and shoved him down into the chair at the desk.

He did, however, look up at him dully, his air all but defeated.

"Here's a mystery, then," L said coldly, throwing the notebook down onto the desk, making Light flinch. "You wrote a story and it became reality – only you protest that you _didn't_ write it." L folded his arms. "Except that I see something of a hole in that argument, Light-kun. You _did_ write that story – the one about the politicians being murdered. It's called _Death Note_."

"That's not what I meant!" Light burst out, averting his gaze. "Yes, I wrote that story. But _B_... I never wrote B. I had a plan for it, for _him_, in the fourth book I had started, but I never..." He glanced up at L again properly. "The same goes for you."

"Huh." L looked past Light at the window. "B and I... Are we the same? That is, is one of us a discarded version of the other?"

"Why do you assume that I'll be able to answer that?" Light asked stiffly.

"I just have a hunch that you have been miraculously cured of your amnesia," L replied idly, nodding towards the notebook. "Of course, if I am wrong, please forgive my insensitivity."

Light clenched his fists on his lap but said nothing, although he certainly took note of the slight smirk that ghosted across L's pale face.

"I started writing it," Light said at length. "Four chapters. Neither you nor B were in it at that point – your only... "existence" was in notebooks."

"Regardless of that," L said levelly, "you stopped. Why?"

"Car crash," Light said sullenly.

L nodded.

"Yes, I can't argue with that," he agreed absently. "However... you gave Mikami the four chapters before the crash."

"Four days before the crash," Light added blandly.

L looked sharply at him.

"Four?"

Light nodded, half-smiling – although was sour and ironic.

"Are you seeing a pattern, L? Four, four, _four_."

"The death number." L folded him arms. "Light-kun, at this point am I afraid that I will find it exceedingly difficult to believe that you did not orchestrate all this in some way prior to your memory loss."

"That's a fair enough assumption."

"I'd prefer a confession to an assumption."

"Of course." Light's eyes glinted. "That's how I wrote you, after all."

"And _why_ write me?" L pushed. "Why create another detective when you already had one? Ryuk, right? And where _is_ Ryuk? Why hasn't he come out of the books the way B and I have?"

"Why write you?" Light asked, ignoring L's subsequent questions; he glanced behind L at the bed, still littered with various examples of detective fiction, some of them a little crumpled, and several torn to pieces. "I don't know. Maybe I was just tired of Ryuk... No." He gave a sudden abrupt shake of his head. "No, I know what it was. It was an experiment." He suddenly got up and swept past L, going to the bed to look down at his scattered collection of detective literature.

"...Experiment?" L repeated, turning towards him and watching the boy lift two books, one in each hand.

_The Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. Batman: World's Greatest Detective Collection._

"Writing, like anything, is something that you will get better at the more you do it," Light said absently, looking from one cover to the other. "That goes for every aspect of the practice of writing – command of vocabulary, weaving of plot, creation of characters. I guess you could say... that even after writing two books about him, I just wasn't completely satisfied with Ryuk. He wasn't a good enough character. He wasn't a good enough detective." He glanced at L over his shoulder. "So I rethought. I figured I'd just start over. I'd rebuild a better detective using source material. You see, I noticed something." He finally turned properly towards L, holding up the books. "Right from the get-go – and by that I mean Poe's creation of Dupin – there is a trend in fictional detectives. They're always the _best_. Poe described Dupin's genius as perhaps the result of a "diseased intelligence" – that is, his overly-logical way of thinking is abnormal, above the ability of most men. The same is true of other fictional detectives like Sherlock Holmes, who even looks down upon the police force because he knows that he will always solve any case that they cannot. Even Batman, who crosses the line between detective fiction and the American tradition of comic book superheroes, is often billed as the 'World's Greatest Detective'. I was not so ambitious with Ryuk – not so _arrogant_, perhaps, as to declare him anything of the sort. But I found that it reflected on him when I tried to write him. Sure, he could solve the case, but there were others who could solve it better and faster than him. He was good, but he wasn't the best, and that's because I'd _written_ him that way."

Light gave a sigh and threw the Poe book back onto the bed, taking the _Batman_ graphic novel in both hands and looking critically at the cover.

"It wasn't just that, though," he went on. "I was also tired of following the formula – you said yourself that detective fiction is largely formulaic. Conan Doyle followed Poe and Christie followed Conan Doyle and Chandler followed Christie. Sure, Dupin, Holmes, Poirot and Marlowe are all brilliant detectives, but why do they choose to pursue their hobby? None of them have ever been touched by crime – they, as detectives, were not _born_ of it. Not like _him_."

Light turned the _Batman_ book towards L on this, fingers splayed across the full-colour spread of the Dark Knight crouched like a great bird of prey on the head of grizzled, hideous gargoyle, ragged cape flying, stark against the artistic full moon that shone like falling chalk dust over the uneven spikes and dips of Gotham City.

He raised his amber eyes to meet with L over the horizon of the book.

"He's different to the others," the young author said, "and it's not just because he wears tights and a cape. His determination to fight crime stems from the incident that made an orphan of him. Aged eight years old, Bruce Wayne is walking home with his parents, Thomas and Martha Wayne, from a trip to the movies when a robber holds them up, demanding money. Instead he sees the string of pearls around Martha Wayne's neck and reaches out to snatch them. Thomas Wayne intervenes on behalf of his wife and is shot for his trouble; Martha instinctively screams and is shot too. Hearing the police sirens coming closer, summoned by the gunshots, the robber panics and flees, leaving Bruce standing in the alley with only the corpses of his parents for company." Light lowered the book further. "_That's_ why I did it. That's why I created you out of a newspaper story. Bruce Wayne's sense of justice is far more personal because he is the victim of a terrible crime. I wondered... what it would be like to take that one step further. Batman's agenda is vengeance. For you, not merely a witness to a murder but in fact a murder victim yourself, your agenda would be _revenge_. What better reason would a detective have to desire to punish, for example, a murderer than if he himself had been murdered?"

"And that's me? Am I a perfect creation as far as detectives go, then? A murder victim who somehow grows up to be the world's greatest detective?"

"I guess it sounds pretty stupid when you put it that way," Light said absently.

"And what about B?" L asked in a low voice.

"You can blame Poe for that," Light said, his tone casual, as though Edgar Allan Poe was some personal friend of his.

"And how might I do that, Light-kun?" L inquired sourly.

"That's where I got the idea of the doppelganger from. _William Wilson _is the best example of it, where a man is stalked by a double bearing the same name as him, but in the last of Poe's Dupin tales, _The Purloined Letter_, there is a hint that the villain of the story is perhaps, in fact, Dupin's brother. Of course, I'm not the first to jump on _that_ bandwagon – Professor Moriarty might not have been Holmes' _physical_ double, but there is no doubt whatsoever that their minds were exactly equal. You said yourself that they were two sides of the same coin."

L nodded distractedly, not taking his eyes off Light – suddenly so full of answers.

"And which of us came first?"

Light blinked, slightly surprised.

"_You_, of course."

"That doesn't seem to be what B thinks," L replied.

"He's not talking about the order I created you in," Light said impatiently. "He's talking about the story."

"The story that you didn't write."

"Exactly."

"So I guess you'll just have to _tell_ me the story, then," L said.

"What does it matter?" Light asked in a low voice, looking away. "That story is not the one that B has taken such pains to bring to life..."

"Because I need you to tell me absolutely everything that you know in order to solve this case," L snapped, making Light look sharply back at him. "And isn't that what you _want_, Light-kun? Don't you want all this to stop?"

Light looked at him a moment longer, exhaling deeply.

"Yes," he said defeatedly. "But I can only tell you so much. I didn't plan the whole thing. I didn't know how to end it."

"That's fine."

"Okay, so... the plot of the fourth book mostly revolved around you trying to solve this cold murder case. It was the murder case of a child found in the woods on Halloween years and years before – the twist was that you were solving your _own_ murder case, only you didn't realise it until the big reveal. In the meantime you were also supposed to be catching this other murderer, one who looked exactly like you. He called himself 'B' because he said he was second-best, only your reflection."

"And was he?"

Light shook his head.

"No," he said. "He was your murderer."

L had no reply to that. Light bit at his lip, feeling strangely sort of... ashamed.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "Somehow... it feels okay to be so cruel when you're creating fiction. You and he were meant to be childhood friends. You played together a lot but he was terribly jealous of you. He wanted to _be_ you in many respects. That Halloween, you went out to play with him in the woods and he killed you. He thought that with you dead, he could be you. Only it wasn't that simple. You didn't stay dead. That made it worse. He haunted you the way you haunted him. He'd murdered you and even then he was still second to you. So then he found another child, one that looked kind of like you, and killed him the way he had killed you. It was a message to tell you that he wasn't done with you."

"_Near_," L said faintly.

"That's as far as I got planning it," Light said. "I didn't know where to go from there and hoped I'd be able to come up with an ending when I got there. So I started writing instead."

"And then you stopped," L said. "_Why_?"

Light looked at him, his face pale.

"Because that's when B showed up."

There was a bout of silence between them, strung like a spider web, barely-there but strong.

And then came the pounding on the front door.

The little colour that had been in Light's face to begin with drained right out of it and he dropped the _Batman_ book as he backed against the bed. L froze, but he appeared less shaken, tilting his head curiously. There was a pause, and then came the hammering again.

"Yagami!" they heard, yelled through the wood. "Get your ass out here!"

"It's not B," L said blandly, sticking his hands in his pockets and starting out of the bedroom. "That sounds like Mello."

He didn't wait for any kind of response on Light's part, drifting out into the hall and moving towards the shaking front door, unlatching it and opening it with a gentleness quite contrastive to the way that Mello – for it was indeed him, with Matt several feet behind him, looking wearily apologetic – was kicking at the panels.

"You," Mello spat on seeing him. "What are you, _chained_ to Yagami or something?"

"Not chained, as such," L replied pleasantly.

Mello merely gave a snort, elbowing past L into the apartment.

"I have questions for you too, don't get me wrong," he hissed, "but right now I want to see that wretched hack writer."

"Of course," L said ironically, since Mello was long since past him; he gestured politely to Matt, who stepped into the apartment with a silent, tired nod, trudging after his partner.

L shut the door and followed Matt into the bedroom, finding that Mello had already backed Light against the wall.

"Okay, Yagami, you listen to me," Mello spat. "I am _done_ fucking playing around here. Matt and I just found your agent, Teru Mikami, face-down, stone-dead with a massive _knife_ sticking out of his back in his office. What do you have to say to _that_?!"

Light stared at him in mingled shock and horror, eyes wide, completely dumbstruck. Eventually he looked past Mello at L in desperation.

"What time was this at?" L asked, stepping in, although directing his questions more towards Matt – the much calmer of the two.

"Somewhere between one and midnight," Matt replied. "Had to have been recent." He looked from L to Light and back again. "Truth is, it's not even that we necessarily think that Light did it, but whether he did or not – and has an alibi or not – it can't be denied that there's a very odd circle of events that surround him and his books."

"I didn't kill Mikami!" Light burst out. "I was here the whole time. L was with me! You can ask him!"

"Oh, sure, like we're going to take _his_ word for anything," Mello spat, glancing over his shoulder at L. "I said I had questions for you and I do, _L_: Like _where_ exactly you got your detective's licence from. See, the thing is – and don't take this wrong way, either of you – but Matt's right. There's something seriously weird going on around here, and _you two_ are at the centre of it."

L only smiled.

"Yes, _that_ I certainly can't argue with," he agreed. "But really, you two couldn't have come at a better time. Now we can all solve the mystery together."

Mello stiffened, finally turning towards L properly.

"You think this is a _game_, you bastard?" he growled.

L shook his head.

"Not a game," he said. "A story. "Detective Fiction", I believe you call it."

Matt frowned.

"What do you mean?" he asked carefully. He nodded towards Light. "I know... he's a writer, but—"

"That's it," L interrupted. "But let's lay a few things on the table first. To be frank, the both of you are going to find some of this a little hard to swallow, but you'll have to humour us and do the best that you can to believe it. It's the only way we'll get to the bottom of all this." He looked at Mello. "I know exactly what you want to ask me. You want to ask me if I'm even a real detective."

Mello said nothing, but his scowl answered for him.

"The answer is, to my disappointment as much as your own, no," L went on. "I'm not a real detective. I'm not even a real _person_, as it turns out. I am a character created by Light-kun for his fourth novel."

Mello and Matt exchanged glances, completely silent.

"Right," Mello snapped at length, "if you guys are just gonna fuck with us, you can come down the precinct with us right now and spend the night in a cell."

But L only grinned.

"Sounds crazy, right? But it's the truth. Light-kun is capable of writing stories that come true. If you suspend your disbelief... doesn't that make everything make a whole lot more sense?"

More silence.

"You seriously expect us to believe that?" Matt finally said flatly.

"About as much as I expect you to believe in a notebook that kills people," L replied with a shrug.

"No, this _doesn't_ make sense!" Mello exploded. "It's nonsense, and you know it as well as I do! What makes sense is that someone is after _him_!" He pointed accusing at Light. "Isn't it obvious that this is sabotage? A string of murders that emulates the plot of one of his books, the murder of his agent... For god's sake, even his _girlfriend_ was hit by a goddamn car!"

L blinked, taken aback by that last statement; he glanced at Light, still over by the wall. He had gone completely white, staring at Mello in horror.

"Taka... H-how do you know about Takada?" he asked quietly.

"Please," Mello snorted. "It's called the internet."

"Light, can you think of _anyone_ who would want to do this to you?" Matt asked.

"I... no." Light violently shook his head. "No, you've both got it all _wrong_! L and I know who the murderer is, but that... that doesn't have _anything_ to do with Takada!"

All three detectives – two real and one of Light's own fancy – were now watching him in silence, bidding him to continue.

"It's as L says," Light sighed finally. "Some things I write... become real. L is one of those things. So is the murderer. His name is B and what he's doing isn't sabotage, but _revenge_. In the story, it was L that he hated, but here in the real world, where that story doesn't exist... his anger isn't directed at L, but rather at me, because _I'm_ the one who created him. However, as I said... that has nothing to do with Takada. She died before I even wrote _Ryuk_. It was... an accident, but all the same, I admit... that I killed her."

Yet more silence.

"Yagami," Mello finally sighed impatiently, kneading at his forehead with his knuckles, "you can't _possibly_ have killed Kiyomi Takada. She was hit by a car. You have a perfectly solid alibi. You were nowhere near the scene of the accident."

Light didn't reply, but finally pushed away from the wall, crossing the room towards the desk. He picked up the notebook – the one so long buried in a shallow grave – and began to flip rapidly through it, his eyes flickering back and forth over the pages as he searched for something. At length he thrust the open notebook out towards Matt and Mello, his expression somehow satisfied and grim all at once.

There, in Light's own neat kanji, was the condemning statement he must surely have known about all along.

_Kiyomi Takada drives me insane, but despite her constant disagreeing with me on everything under the sun, she clings to me still because she doesn't think anyone else is good enough for her. At least if she was hit by a car I'd be rid of her forever without having to fight with her about it._

"I was venting," Light said in a low voice. "We'd had an argument and she stormed out like she always did. I really hated her by the end even though she was supposed to be my girlfriend, but I honestly didn't mean for her to... I mean, I didn't think that my writing that would..."

"So this was the first thing you wrote that came true?" L deduced, looking up from the page.

Light nodded.

"I didn't mean it," he said again. "And I thought... it was just a coincidence. I mean, she was pretty mad, so she probably wasn't looking where she was going, but... well, a few months after that, B showed up."

L gave a thoughtful nod of his own.

"My biggest question," he said, "is _how_ you are able to make things that you write become real. Is it the notebook?"

Light shook his head.

"It can't be," he replied. "True, both the character notes on B and the stupid message wishing that Takada would get hit by a car are in _this_ notebook, but the character notes on _you_ are in the one I hid in the drawer of my desk."

"Where did you buy them?"

"The stationary shop at my university – but they're not the same type."

"What about the pens, then?" L pressed, completely cutting off Mello, who had opened his mouth. "Do you always use the same pen?"

"No." Light opened his desk drawer as he said it, blue and black biros skittering across the false bottom to illustrate his point.

"Then, Light-kun," L said blandly, making Light look at him again, "that means that it's _you_."

Light said nothing, merely lowering his gaze and biting at his bottom lip. Even though he hadn't wanted to hear it, it was what he had known L would say.

Hell, he had probably put the words in the world's greatest detective's mouth himself.

"It's you, Light," L said again, his voice a little gleeful, excitable; filled with all the self-satisfaction that Light had put into him as he fulfilled his purpose and – more or less – cracked the case. "This is all because of you – B, Near, me, the murders... _You're_ the one doing this."

"Stop it!" Light put his hands over his ears in yet another ridiculous, childish charade, trying to physically block L's words from getting into his brain and bouncing around like marbles inside his skull. "I didn't mean for this! _Stop it_!"

"No, Light-kun," L chirped, stepping up to him and grasping his wrists, prising them away from his head. "_You_ stop it. You want it to stop? Then _make_ it stop."

"How?!" Light exploded desperately.

"The same way you made it start," L replied, shoving Light back towards the desk. "You said you started writing a story that had no ending – that is, nothing to tie B and I into the story that you weaved for us. So I guess you'll just have to _write_ an ending, one in which B doesn't win."

"I can't!" Light cried, thrashing away from the desk as though it was the gateway to Hell.

"Yes, you can," L said in a hard voice, seemingly beginning to lose his patience. "You have your memory back—"

"No, I can't write anymore!" Light interrupted, near-hysterical, trying to wrench himself out of L's grip. "I can never write anything else, not after B, not after...! _Why do you think I wrote that crash in the first place, L_?!"

L let go of him, but he was smiling faintly; Light backed up, panting.

"You wrote it?" L repeated, smirking.

Light nodded silently, reaching for the notebook again.

"I didn't intend to ever regain my memories," he said. "I just wanted to forget about everything. I didn't want to be a writer anymore, but I needed a reason to quit. I knew that if I just stopped... well, Mikami would never leave me alone, always pestering me for a new book—"

"Yes," L murmured. "I can see that. I guess the only way you'd ever get peace from that vulture of an agent would be if he..."

Light's head snapped up, his eyes wide; L shrugged at him.

"I wouldn't imagine that B is immune to your charms," he said simply.

"I... I didn't want him to _kill_ Mikami!"

"Are you sure?"

"I..." Light gave a sudden violent shake of his head and thrust the notebook towards L again. "Look, I didn't want to have anything more to do with this! I thought that if I... couldn't remember anything about my stories, and if I made it so that I could never write another book, everything would just stop...!"

In Light's own writing again, clean and clear on the page:

_I know there are those who will never let Kira rest, but even Kira can't control the story anymore. I'm so afraid of it that I don't even know how to begin to write it. I can't think of an ending, so a car crash will simply have to do it for me._

"But here we are, Light," L said softly, looking up from the page. "It didn't work. _I'm_ here because you wanted a solution, and I've given you the answer. I can do nothing more. You're the only one who can end this."

"I'm not writing _anything_!" Light spat at him, throwing the notebook to the floor.

"That's right – you're not." Mello, who hadn't made a sound for a surprisingly long time, suddenly made his move, a _metallic_ click punctuating his words. "You two are coming down to the precinct with us right now. I've seriously had enough of this crap."

Light blinked down at the silver bracelet that he suddenly found encircled around his wrist; turning his head towards the direction of the second click, finding himself handcuffed to L.

Matt didn't say anything at all, but his shoulders heaved as he gave a silent sigh.

L, examining the handcuff around his own wrist, giving a tug on it to see how securely he was actually fastened to Light.

"Huh," he murmured at length. "Good idea. Wish I'd thought of it."

* * *

She looked like she had just come back from a club or a bar or something – her gold hair completely loose down her back, her mouth a bright crimson gash, her eyes thickly outlined with kohl and shimmery grey eyeshadow. Little scarlet dress, black velvet choker, silver bracelets jingling like bells, fishnet tights and black ankle boots.

Misa Amane stood at the front door of her apartment and rifled through her bag, supporting it on her hip as she searched for her keys. The jangle of them as she fished them out between two carefully-painted nails covered the sound of his footsteps as he approached her.

She did, however, see his shadow, superimposed over hers as she leaned towards her front door to open it. She whipped around, backing against the door, clearly frightened.

But then she relaxed, breathing a sigh of relief.

"Oh, it's you," she said. "Don't sneak up on a girl like that." She looked him up and down. "I see you changed your clothes. You really didn't have to take what I said so seriously, you know. I mean, sure, you looked fifty years out of date, but I was kind of in a bad mood when I said you should wear yellow."

He merely tilted his head at her.

"What do you want at this time of night, anyway?" she asked, resuming her campaign of opening her door again.

"I have a message for you, Misa Amane," he replied in a sing-song voice. "It's from Kira."

* * *

There was an envelope on the desk when the four of them entered Mello and Matt's temporary office.

"You can sit down," Matt said wearily to L and Light – still cuffed together – as Mello stomped to the desk and snatched up the letter.

"I swear to god," Mello muttered, tearing open the envelope savagely, "if this is a note from downstairs saying they've found _another_ fucking body..."

Light dipped his head as he sank into a chair next to L, looking fixedly at the dirty, cheap carpet. He'd run out of things to say, to defend himself with. If they dragged him down to a cell and tossed him in and left him to rot, he honestly didn't think he would even care. He all but accepted responsibility for all of this—

"Oh, wait, my mistake," Mello hissed, raising his gaze and settling it on Light. "This is for you, Yagami."

Light's head jerked up. He glanced from Mello (who looked seriously pissed off) to Matt (who looked like he wanted to go and bang his head against a wall) to L (who didn't look surprised).

"For... for me?" he asked, barely able to get the words out.

"It says 'Dear Kira'," Mello snapped, storming over and throwing the letter at him.

Light didn't want to look. He didn't touch the note, which had landed in his lap, half-folded. In the end, L reached over and picked it up, holding it loose and open enough for Matt – leaning over Light, lighter halfway to the new cigarette dangling from his mouth – to see it.

It was written in red, but although on first glance it looked like blood, on second glance it was clear that it was, in fact, written in... what looked very much like _lipstick_.

The scarlet drew his gaze. He didn't want to read it, didn't want anything more to do with _any_ of this, but he couldn't help but read the letter addressed to him.

_Dear Kira,_

_You can't run away from this. Deny it all you want, but this began because you wanted it to. Don't start stories you have no intention of finishing, because if you do that, I'll finish them for you, you little coward._

_B_

_P.S: Thought this story needed a damsel in distress. I'm going to kill her at the Yellowbox Warehouse at dawn. Come and watch if you want. It'll be better than any ending that you could ever write._

"First Mikami, now Misa Amane," L mused.

"Misa?" Light barely dared to look at him. "H-how... do you know?"

"You mean, aside from being the world's greatest detective?" L looked at the ceiling thoughtfully. "Well, you said – or _wrote_, rather – yourself that there were people who would never let Kira rest. You don't want to be Kira anymore, so it makes sense... that you would get rid of anyone who puts their faith in Kira and what he has created. Misa Amane, unintentional spokesperson for those who believe in the moral lessons in _Death Note_, herself more or less a believer—"

"You're implying that he _wants_ her dead?" Mello spat; but he was paler now, the appearance of the letter having clearly shaken rather a lot of his indignant anger and disbelief out of him.

"I _don't_!" Light exploded. "I don't want Misa dead! We... we have to do something, we have to _save_ her—"

"I wasn't _implying_ anything," L murmured, ignoring Light. "I was merely pointing out a coincidence. And speaking of coincidences..." He looked at Light. "Light-kun, I've been wondering for a while now. What does 'B' stand for? Backup?" He suddenly smirked. "Bruce Wayne? _Batman_?"

Light shook his head, crumpling the lipstick-letter in his hand.

"Boredom," he said flatly.

* * *

In case anyone was wondering exactly how this chapter was me "getting back to my roots"... well, heh, feels like I haven't gone off on one about Batman in a while. And my first fic on here had him in it. Briefly. As an attendee at Robin's funeral. Robin being where my pen-name comes from.

Logic fail.

(Incidentally, less time has elapsed between me last going off on one about Batman than me last going off on one about Edgar Allan Poe. Go figure. Ironically, it being October – and with Halloween fast approaching – the pair of them are really farther fitting topics to be going off on one about.)

I honestly think that I will need only one more chapter to wrap this all up neatly! I'll try not to be so slooooooooooow with it this time, I promise! (And by that I mean I won't move countries again...)

I already announced this on my last update for _The Ghost in the Machine_, but I figured I'd mention it here as well: Is anyone going to YaoiCon? Narroch and I are going and I was curious as to whether we shall have the pleasure of bumping into any of you. :)

Til next time!

RR xXx


End file.
